School Crossing Patrol and Road Safety

At Bosbury School we are very lucky to have a School Crossing Patrol Officer (SCPO, or, yes, lollipop man if you prefer...!), who is unusually employed by the school itself rather than the local Council to help children and their parents cross the often-busy road outside school in the morning and in the afternoon.

Mr. Ponter is our SCPO, and the crossing patrol normally operates between 8:40am and 8:50am in the mornings, and 3:20pm to 3:30pm in the afternoons. Please note that the crossing patrol may be unavailable on occasion due to Mr. Ponter being needed to cover classes or accompany children on trips - these occasions will always be notified to parents via the school's text messaging service. Parents and carers should take extra care when crossing their children over the road when the SCPO is unavailable.

Speaking of crossing the road, with several lovely new families joining us this year, we thought it would be useful to provide a reminder of road safety at Bosbury in order to ensure that our school community continues to be kept as safe as possible:

If you need to cross the road to school from the church side, it is always safest to use the SCPO who crosses children and their parents to the left of the school drive as shown by the green arrows above. Remember to cross in front of the SCPO and not behind, and please remind your children not to cross until Mr. Ponter says the infamous words, "Cross now!". Please try and avoid crossing children to the right of the school drive where cars often park as shown by the red arrows above - visibility is greatly reduced when crossing children in-between parked cars, and there is the added danger of parked cars suddenly reversing.

Please drive safely and DO NOT exceed 30mph when driving in the village - 20mph is more advisable when in front of the school during the busiest times of day. DO NOT park on the yellow zig-zag lines found directly outside the school entrance, even if it is only for a few seconds to drop children off. This is enforceable by law and can make it difficult for the SCPO to cross children and their parents safely, as well as being dangerous at a time when there are lots of people using the top of the school drive. Please also avoid parking directly in front of the church gates, and also along the path between the village hall and church - parking in these places again causes dangerous obstructions to pedestrians as well as reducing visibility for the SCPO.

If no parking spaces are available on the school side of the road or on the stretch of wider pavement in front of the churchyard, the village hall car park is available to use, but please ensure that you only park here for as long as necessary to drop off and collect children from school. Parents should be vacated from this car park by 9:15am in the morning and 3:45pm in the afternoon (4:15pm when after school clubs are on). Occasionally the village hall car park may be closed to parents due to the hall having been booked for an event - these closures will be notified to parents again via the school's text messaging service and we ask that parents please comply with any closures.

Please DO NOT drive down to the school car park to drop off or collect children unless you have been obstructed to do so by staff in order to collect children, for example in a medical emergency. Please also DO NOT park in the side road to the right of the school bollards - this is a private drive and we are extremely keen as a school to maintain good relations with our neighbours. We do not advise parking down the lane to the right of the churchyard unless there is no other option as the narrow lane coupled with cars using this junction to turn around can create a significant hazard to pedestrians.

Take care when waiting with children in the school car park at the start of the day or collecting them at the end of the day, as there may be staff vehicles moving. Please keep to the paths provided, and please also encourage your children not to stand on or jump between the stone bollards at the front of school - we have had a number of nasty accidents on these in the past. Other than our lovely school dogs Teddy and Otto, we do not allow any other dogs on to the school site.

A HUGE thank you to all of our pupils, parents and carers for complying with the above instructions, helping to keep our school community as safe as possible, and maintaining good relations with our neighbours and the Bosbury village community.

                                                                  STOP! Are they School Crossing Patrol wardens of the future...?