‘Getting Started’ and Working at GCA
Site opening times
The school site is open to staff from 7.00am – 9.00pm Monday – Friday during term time.
During school holidays prior arrangement should be made for access with the site manager.
Learning Session times & 3:2 days
The session times for the school day are shown below:
It should be noted that on some occasions the school operates a 3:2 scheme whereby lunch is brought forward by 1 hour and there are 3 teaching sessions before lunch and 2 sessions after lunch. These scheduling adjustments generally take place during examination period and are communicated via the school calendar and also in staff briefings.
|
Registration
|
8.40
|
9.00
|
|
Period 1
|
9.00
|
10.00
|
|
Period 2
|
10.00
|
11.00
|
|
BREAK
|
11.00
|
11.20
|
|
Period 3
|
11.20
|
12.20
|
|
Period 4
|
12.20
|
13.20
|
|
LUNCH
|
13.20
|
14.00
|
|
Registration
|
14.00
|
14.05
|
|
Period 5
|
14.05
|
15.05
|
Car parking arrangements
The designated parking areas are in the main staff & visitor car park at the most northerly entrance to site and in front of the sports hall, which is accessed via the bus car park entrance. Both car parks are segregated into bays. Please make sure that you park within a marked bay.
There are designated bays for disabled users adjacent to the main bus car park.
The school aims to ensure the safety of all users of its car parks and to segregate pedestrians and vehicles wherever possible. All drivers must exercise due care and attention when manoeuvring in the car park. Please take care when reversing.
Drivers are reminded that they bring their vehicles onto the school site at their own risk. Drivers should be aware at all times of the need for safety and vigilance as would apply on the public highways or in any other private premises. Garstang Community Academy will not accept responsibility for damage, accident or loss to vehicles or contents.
Valuables should not be left in your vehicle when it is unattended.
The barrier on the staff and visitor car park will be closed at 3.00pm until 3.15pm each day to prevent any movement of traffic on or off site whilst the students are leaving the school premises by foot.
Catering arrangements
We operate a cashless catering system in school whereby staff and pupils alike must preload their account with money by either using the specific catering cash deposit machine in the dining hall or the cash deposit box in the main reception area. The catering team are not obliged to serve you if you do not have sufficient credit on your account.
As part of the induction process the biometric software will take a picture of your fingerprint which is then broken down into data points and encrypted in an alphanumeric data string and stored on our own GCA server. No-one has access to this information and it can never be read as anything other than a string of numbers and letters. Please be assured the software is very secure.
A wide variety of hot and cold food, cakes, biscuits and drinks are served from a number of outlets at break time and lunchtime; 2 in the main dining room and 1 in the Fairsnape building. Sandwiches can be pre-ordered at break time using the forms in the staff room. They will be available for collection at the start of lunch from the staff room. Tea, coffee and biscuits are also available for you to purchase in the staff room at break.
Staff Duties
Staff Duties
All members of teaching staff are required to carry out certain duties around school throughout the day. The responsibilities are assigned by Tony Holliday.
Lunchtime Supervision
Lunchtime Supervision is voluntary and if you would like more details on duty responsibilities and opportunities please speak to Tony Holliday.
Accessing the school IT network
The computer network is owned by the school and is made available to students to further their education and to staff to enhance their professional activities including teaching, research, administration and management. The school’s ICT Security Policy has been drawn up to protect the whole school community and the full policy can be found in the Section – Policies and Procedures.
Unavoidable closure guidance
In the event of school needing to close due to an unforeseen circumstance i.e. severe weather conditions or building damage that leaves school unfit for purpose, please note the following ways school would relay this information to you:
1] Please check the schools web site (www.garstangcommunityacademy.com). This is the preferred method as information can be remotely posted onto the front page within 5 minutes of updates being received. If you know of a fellow school member who does not have internet access, please could you be mindful of sharing the information with them? Thank you.
2] Closure notices are available from local radio stations; Rock FM 97.4
(www.rockfm.co.uk/closure) & Radio Lancashire 95.5 FM.
Follow @garstangacademy on Twitter
3] The text messaging service can also be remotely accessed and therefore the utmost effort will be made to send out a text with the same information as the website page.
4] Where possible the school telephone answering message will be changed to relay up to date information.
We also try to inform staff individually following a line management tree. Therefore, if you would like to be informed in this way, please make sure that your line manager has your contact details. If you do not supply them with your details, you will need to gain your information via the channels highlighted above.
If you are a line manager, please be aware of who you do line manage and have any contact details with you at home to enable you to fulfil your role in the organization structure.
This information will be duplicated in reverse to relay information regarding re-opening.
Absence reporting procedure
If you are absent from work because of sickness all staff, teaching and non-teaching, must notify the attendance team immediately, at least by 7.45 on the day of absence and on each successive day afterwards by 7.45. This process not only enables provision to be made for your absence but is also required to comply with GCA’s emergency procedures.
Absence reporting line: Tel 01995 607294.
If your sickness is expected to last longer than a week (i.e. seven days including Saturday and Sunday) you must obtain a Doctor’s Statement and submit it to the School Business Manager by the eighth day. Failure to do so may result in suspension of salary.
On the day of return from absence, teaching staff must make an appointment for a ‘back to work interview’ with the Head teacher and support staff must make an appointment with the School Business Manager. It is the responsibility of the employee to ensure this procedure is followed.
For more details regarding absence management refer to the Absence Policy.
Data protection
Garstang Community Academy will comply with all statutory requirements of the Date Protection Act by registering all personal data held on its computer and/or related electronic equipment and by taking all reasonable steps to ensure the accuracy and confidentiality of such information.
The Data Protection Act protects individuals’ rights concerning information about them held on computer. Anyone processing personal data must comply with the eight principles of good practice. Data must be:
• fairly and lawfully processed
• processed for limited purposes
• adequate, relevant and not excessive
• accurate
• not kept longer than necessary
• processed in accordance with the data subject’s rights
• secure
• not transferred to countries without adequate protection
Employees can request access to the information held on them by the Company. All requests by employees to gain access to their personnel records should be made in writing.
Trade Union Membership
It is your choice as to whether you wish to belong to a trade union recognised by the Garstang Community Academy. This is one way in which you will be able to make your views known on all issues affecting staff within the Company and have a recognised route to resolve issues affecting groups of staff where other methods have not been effective. In addition, the unions can provide personal representation for you if you experience difficulties at work via their accredited representative system. The Company recognises the following Trade Unions:
ASCL,NAHT, NUT, NASUWT, ATL, UNISON, UNITE, GMB.