There was great excitement on Tuesday this week as a new building was installed at St Peter’s.  The project has been many years in the planning and fundraising, but at long last (with final delays caused by the snow that never came and the high winds that certainly did!) the building has arrived.  During the day each class spent time on the playground to watch the units being craned in from lorries and carefully positioned in place.

Over the next 4 weeks the building will be fitted out and brick clad, and will provide the school with an additional indoor open learning space, teacher office space and a kitchenette for pupils to do cooking.  This project is the result of a lot of much appreciated fundraising by families and the Friends of St Peter’s, and has been realised through the visions and commitment of the school governors, the financial support of the Diocese and the excellent project management of the school business manager Mrs Kate Philips.  Thank you to all families who changed their travel plans and means of accessing the site on the day to allow us not to worry about crane work and lorry movement.

A well-deserved half term rest now beckons for us all!

Mr R Cunningham
Headteacher

Dear Parents and Carers

On Tuesday 12th February 2019 we will aim, once again, to take delivery of our new building.  This will involve a crane being on site all day, a series of articulated lorries accessing the site during the day, and a fleet of contractor vehicles arriving as well.  All of this vehicle and plant traffic will take up a lot of our car parking space throughout the whole of Tuesday 12th February 2019.

Because of this, with the exception of vehicles which have a St Peter’s pass for those drivers or pupils with limited mobility or additional needs, there will be no parking spaces on site for parents and carers to leave their cars and drop their children into the south playground in the morning.

For children being dropped off for Breakfast Club or additional provision from 8:00am, car drivers are asked to use the one way route and drop-off walkway alongside the north playground.  Extra staff will be on hand to welcome and direct the children into school.

The one way route to the drop-off walkway that runs by the north playground will be opened 10 minutes earlier on the Tuesday only, at 8:20am, to help ease a possible increase in vehicle use for that option.  For that Tuesday only, additional staff will be on duty in the north playground to welcome any extra children who would normally wait in the south playground with parents or carers but who instead will be dropped off to the north playground.  Any families that are able to car share and so reduce the number of cars coming into St Peter’s in the morning would be greatly appreciated.

Families who would rather stay with their children on the south playground but normally do this by parking on site are asked to allow plenty of time to be able to park off-site and walk onto St Peter’s grounds.  The timing for the south playground gate will remain between 8:30am and 8:50am as normal.

St Peter’s staff have been asked to car share, use alternative means of transport, park off-site and even offer up their local driveways for colleagues in an effort to reduce the vehicle presence on site as much as possible during the building delivery day.

Collection at 3:15pm will be as normal on foot for all families, with the exception of vehicles which have a St Peter’s pass for those drivers or pupils with limited mobility or additional need.

Families collecting from after-school care at 3:45pm and 4:15pm, and any clubs from 4:00pm onwards, will need to park off site to access and exit St Peter’s on foot.

I know that these changes will have an impact on families’ travel arrangements for Tuesday 12th February 2019, but any possible inconvenience will be long forgotten when the pupils get to enjoy the additional space and facilities that the new building will provide from March 2019 onwards.

Mr R Cunningham
Headteacher

During the week at St Peter’s, the children have welcomed special guests to enhance their learning.

The youngest pupils in the school played host to Fr Jeremy from the Church of the Sacred Heart and St Peter the Apostle.  As part of the RE curriculum, Fr Jeremy brought vestments and chalices into school to explain to the children their significance in Mass.  Rather bravely, Fr Jeremy also took questions from the 4 and 5 year old pupils, which ranged from the perceptive to the perplexing!  Thank you Fr Jeremy for helping the children with their learning.

Meanwhile, we had canine company for a recent assembly at St Peter’s.

Havant Borough Council’s Animal Welfare Service team deliver an assembly to help children to learn how to approach dogs with care and caution when out in public, and what to do if they felt worried by a stray dog they may meet outdoors.  Natalie and Jaz from the Borough Council brought along Darcy and Zak as fine doggy models, and many children had the chance for a quick pat of the dogs at the end of the assembly.  Thank you to our local authority for providing the outreach education work.

And that brings to an end a week where we were expecting a new building and lots of snow, neither of which arrived!  Thank you all for your patience and efforts in keeping up to date via parent mail and the school website, we will pass information about the new delivery date for the building as soon as we have it confirmed.

Mr R Cunningham
Headteacher