Express & Star

Wolverhampton Grammar School closed as norovirus hits staff

A school in Wolverhampton has closed today after multiple members of staff were hit by a virus.

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Wolverhampton Grammar School

Students and staff at Wolverhampton Grammar School were told not to come in today, after eight teachers – and several students – came down with sickness, believed to be norovirus.

Various events planned for yesterday evening and today were cancelled – and have been rescheduled for another time.

Director of marketing at the Compton Road school Carrie Bennett said the school – which has almost 200 staff overall – took the advice of Public Health England and decided it would be safer to close the school for the day.

She said: "There has been a rise in cases of the stomach bug norovirus across the West Midlands, so perhaps it is not surprising that our school was affected and after taking advice from Public Health England, as a precautionary measure, we decided to keep students at home on Friday and rearrange a number of popular events for next week.

"It'll be all back to normal on Monday."

There were rumours that multiple children were vomiting during the school day, but Ms Bennett said this was "an exaggeration".

"We did have one student who was sick at school earlier in the week, but no-one was sick yesterday that we know of," she added.

The events that have been rescheduled today include a Year 6 performance of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat, which will now be on Tuesday at 2pm.

Senior prize-giving will be included within final school assembly on Thursday.

Jazz spec performances will now be included in various student activities throughout the week.

And the Summer Art Exhibition has been rescheduled to Friday, July 12 from 4 to 7pm in the School’s Viner Gallery and Hutton Theatre.