Am I right in thinking that most boarding schools are only testing symptomatic pupils, not doing whole-population testing?

Dh works at a similar school, but more campus based. He doesn't think they are testing anyone. Boys are bubbled in year groups, within boarding houses. So in classes, they can only sit next to someone in their own House.

Saying that, the inter house singing competition is coming up - no idea how they're going to work that….

Ours is not doing population wide testing, only symptomatic cases. 3 separate year groups currently have had Covid positive cases and are isolating at school or home (given the option). Interesting none occurred until after the first exeat where the whole school bar a few went home for a long w/e. School has done a pretty good job of ensuring no year group interacts even with some mixed age houses but they have a lot of space so could. All cases in the older pupils. School consulted with PHE on each case and was given detailed advice on what to do in terms of pupils / isolation. It's been different for each positive case interestingly.

Boarding school, with a small proportion of day girls of which my DD is one.

I'd personally prefer if they did regular testing as it's now well known many children are asymptomatic. They are silently spreading it around if not identified..

Why are PHE so involved? Positively because they are the body with the greatest relevant expertise. Negatively, I assume because, in practice, they can tell the school (any school) to close. So if the school doesn't want to close, they'd better work with PHE to agree other measures. I am not sure what the legal position is, but it doesn't matter - can you imagine the shitstorm if PHE advised E to close and it didn't?

Ours is most definitely not doing whole population testing. Anyone ill is quarantined in the san and gets tested. Their year group mini bubble isolates. So far a couple of false alarms but no cases.

Noone wants to know if kids have it asymptomatically!! As there have been no positive tests so far it is unlikely.

Chatted to a fair few parents from E and they all are wondering about who is actually making the decisions is it the SLT or PHE and why exactly are PHE so involved?
W can act as they have because to be frank it appeals to children and parents who put academics above everything else,E have tried to keep as much sport,co curric going as they can,I would not send my boy back to school if all he was going to do was sit in his house doing zoom lessons..

@Michaelah - interesting about PHE advice 🤔
From what I’d heard about W, it sounds so extreme that it must be quite hard for the boys to live with (particularly the new ones). There is surely a balance to be struck between taking C19 seriously and taking such severe measures that you may begin to endanger pupils’ mental health. At one of my DC’s schools they are ensuring that they sit next to others from their house in lessons and have adjusted streams etc to allow for this, which seems a reasonable middle way (and no blanket testing!)

Well surely its clear, the answer is to allow boys into Tudors,but not let them sit down...covid solved..
W is a rather different school,not sure what theyve done would have gone down well at E,and of course as they arent testing ..who knows whats actually going on..mind you wouldnt be at all surprised if the next short leave and St Andrews day leave our cancelled

[quote covidstuff]@Revengeofthepangolins there's a school in Hampshire that could offer a few lessons, I gather... W spent the first two weeks, at least, doing lessons on line from the houses, i.e. real house bubbles, not physically mixing with other houses at all, for, in effect, a quarantine period. That's what it takes, I'm afraid. Not sure how they're doing now, mind, but I was impressed by what I heard at the start of term. There is always, of course, a question about whether what you offer is good enough to be worth the risk of having people on site at all. That's obviously why E went the way it did, but I'm afraid it's looking to me as though it gambled and lost. Could still turn around I suppose.[/quote]
Yes W did take a very different course, but it does rely on not letting children out at all, whether for exeats or Sunday lunch etc (not sure where they came out on lunches), and I guess they will have to do it all over again after half term. So in effect the whole school will have twice had two weeks of online school, albeit from a sociable house rather than at home.
And of course, as they haven't tested, they may well have just the same degree of covid as our school - they just don't know about it.
Lord knows what the best thing to do is.

95% boarding

In practice though, short of changing everyone's house so that each house only had one year group in it, I don't really see how house bubbles could work

Ours has done this. No cases so far.

this in addition to the same kind of measures for keeping the years separate within houses that E has been attempting.

@Revengeofthepangolins there's a school in Hampshire that could offer a few lessons, I gather... W spent the first two weeks, at least, doing lessons on line from the houses, i.e. real house bubbles, not physically mixing with other houses at all, for, in effect, a quarantine period. That's what it takes, I'm afraid. Not sure how they're doing now, mind, but I was impressed by what I heard at the start of term. There is always, of course, a question about whether what you offer is good enough to be worth the risk of having people on site at all. That's obviously why E went the way it did, but I'm afraid it's looking to me as though it gambled and lost. Could still turn around I suppose.

In practice though, short of changing everyone's house so that each house only had one year group in it, I don't really see how house bubbles could work, given they need to sit with boys from other houses in class. And most schools haven't reorganised their houses this way, I think, although I think there have been a couple who have made the plunge. Maybe just more strictness with masks and things would help.

Maybe a Christmas hols investment in portocabin bathrooms looms.

If it’s the school I’m thinking of, I know a year 12 who has tested positive and been sent home. Isn’t that an obvious way to spread it around the country? There is a reason that university students aren’t being allowed to go home...

We've seen how successful Trump's policy of testing but not actually taking effective action to prevent spread was. I'm afraid what the school in question has decided to do is very similar. You say testing "regularly", and if it had actually doing that - testing every few days, or at least following up any round of tests that produces positives with another a few days later, until a round produces no positives - then testing might actually have been a useful contribution to controlling spread. Testing just twice, though, while running supposed year-group bubbles but having the years not effectively separated in the houses where they live, though, is arguably the worst of both worlds. They get to know about lots of cases but not in a way that actually stops spread. It's the lack of infection control that's the real problem here, not the testing: there have been enough symptomatic cases that the running of the school would have been seriously disrupted even if the asymptomatic cases had stayed undiscovered.

I'm hoping that if the school opens physically at all after long leave, it will do so with house bubbles.

It'll be interesting to see how many y12 boys actually go back for the last few days before long leave.

Daily temperature taking, multiple times throughout the day. Symptomatic testing only.

To add, some other schools have tested whole populations have have found about 10 per 1000 positive but asymptomatic cases.

The school I work at are only testing with symptoms. It is clear that most kids are asymptomatic and testing whole populations will just send most of the years home. I'm not really sure what the point of any of it is if 70-80% are showing no symptoms, why isolate anyone at all if it's so prevalent. Complete farce really.

@Michaelah Sorry, my mistake. Up to 1 in 200 people (not 20%) - that would seem way too high.

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/englandwalesandnorthernireland2october2020

As it’s done on a sample basis then depending on where in the UK you are, the highest rates are 1 in 500 to 1 in 200, but this extends out into the thousands if you are looking at the true statistical model variations.

Unless we are testing everybody regularly like in some boarding schools then we really won’t know.

I have children at two different full boarding schools. Neither is testing non-symptomatic cases and neither has yet had any positive tests.

Ours take temperature every day, and only come home if temperature and other symptoms.
Mine has a cold and had a temperature a couple of days ago. She just had to stay in medical until it was confirmed a cold, runny nose and eyes etc.
We are ready if they do need to close as we are emergency collection for two friends, in her household bubble. Unless of course they have tested positive. We get one hours notice to collect.

I think this needs to be wider knowledge in terms of implications for schools (and 20% currently have it!?!?!? How!?!? 6 months in would that mean people are getting it repeatedly.)

Figures like this puzzle me as atnone extreme its say 10 cases in the whole borough or possible 20% of people!

Our school is only 25% boarders, and they are only testing those with symptoms. No cases yet 🤞