Dear parents,

As you have probably already heard from the media, the Bavarian State Government ordered on Friday that all schools, kindergartens and day care centres will be closed from Monday, 16 March 2020 up to and including 19 April 2020.

This measure is intended to slow down the rate of infection with coronavirus in Bavaria and to protect groups at risk. Infection-relevant contacts are to be prevented for a total of five weeks, thus slowing down the spread of COVID-19.

In concrete terms, today's order by the state government means that, with a few exceptions, we will no longer be allowed to look after your children from Monday, 16 March 2020 up to and including 19 April 2020, and during this period children will be prohibited from entering IKC and ibsm.

Excluded from this regulation are children whose legal guardians work in areas of critical infra-structure and are prevented from caring for their children due to official or operational necessities.

This includes in particular all facilities that serve to maintain health care and nursing as well as assistance for the disabled, child and youth welfare, public safety and order including non-police danger prevention (fire brigade, rescue service and civil protection), securing public infrastructures (telecommunications services, energy, water, public transport, waste disposal) and the ability of central state, judicial and administrative bodies to act.

A further prerequisite is that no other parent or guardian is available to take over the care. In cases where only one of the two guardians is employed in the area of critical infrastructure, there is no exception, as the other parent must then take over the care. In the case of single parents, it is sufficient if the single parent belongs to the above-mentioned group.

The following conditions also apply:

• The child has no symptoms of illness,
• The child has not been in contact with infected persons or 14 days have passed since contact with infected persons and the child shows no symptoms of illness,
• the child has not stayed in an area that was designated as a risk area by the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) at the time of the stay or was designated as such within 14 days thereafter (daily updates available on the Internet at https://www.rki.de/DE/Content/InfAZ/N/Neuartiges_Coronavirus/Risikogebiete.html, in German) or 14 days have passed since returning from this risk area and no symptoms of illness have been observed.

IKC and ibsm will provide emergency care at the usual school hours/booking times from Monday, 16 March 2020 for children who meet the above criteria.

We kindly ask you to make use of emergency care only if you belong to the group of people defined above and have no alternative care options for your children.

Dear parents, we are absolutely aware that the measures prescribed by the state government will present you with the greatest challenges. We would have been very happy to continue to offer you our services in the usual manner, but we understand that in the interest of everyone's health such far-reaching precautions are necessary.

We kindly ask for your understanding and hope that we will be able to provide you with our full range of childcare services as soon as possible.

Further information is available on the website of the Bavarian Ministry of Education www.km.bayern.de (in German).

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us. You can reach us by email at admission(at)ibsm-school(dot)eu and from Monday, 16 March from 8:00 a.m., telephone number 089 41 11 49 550.