Schools Transactions update 26 March 2020
Read about arrangements in place following school closures
Places for children of key workers
We’ve received a few enquiries about this. Communities & Families are communicating directly with affected parents – please do not ask them to contact school placements.
SEEMiS
Transactions staff currently have no access to SEEMiS for the time being – CGI are working on a solution for all staff.
Free school meals
Families of children from P4 to S6 who receive Free School Meals, and those in P1 to P3 who are entitled to clothing grants, will receive a fortnightly electronic payment during term time and the Easter Holidays equivalent to the cost of a school meal. Families of children in P1 to P3 who have an income-based entitlement to Free School Meals and a clothing grant will be contacted directly.
We have so far issued over 5700 payments to families to meet the cost of Free School Meals due to school closures. These payments reached bank accounts on Monday 23 March and we sent a letter to parents to confirm this.
We are also writing to families of children
- in P4 to S6 who received school meals but not a clothing grant
- in P1 to P3 who are eligible for free school milk, but did not receive a Clothing Grant
to get details to arrange payment. They should receive a letter by the end of this week.
If you receive any enquiries from parents, please ask them to bear with us as we are inundated with enquiries. They do not need to complete new applications. We will still accept new applications for free school meals, but we cannot guarantee when we will be able to process these due to limited resources. We will not be paying out any more clothing grants until the summer.
Education Maintenance Allowances
The Scottish Government has stated:
‘Those young people who are in receipt of EMA and who are unable to meet their agreed attendance requirements due to Coronavirus / Covid-19 either through self-isolating, contracting the virus or through the learning institution being closed will continue to receive their EMA payment.’
We will be making sure we continue to issue payments outside of SEEMiS for students currently in receipt of EMA.
New awards are suspended for the time being, as students are unable to complete their learning agreements. We will review the position before the next payment following the Easter break.
P1/S1 placements for Aug 2020
Fortunately, we completed the allocations before we lost access to SEEMiS. We are receiving a high number of enquiries, mostly change to school preference, places being declined, or second choice requests. We are keeping a log of any changes and we will make the necessary changes once we have access to SEEMiS again.