Have the cohort starting 2020 been writen off by schools?

Btw OP there is a very nice Yr 9 thread, currently running. I joined a particularity lovely thread for year 9 for my ds1 and it's still running and they are all 1st years at Uni.

I have a child in Year 9 and one in Year 11. From reading threads on here and talking to friends everyone thinks their child’s year had it worse. Everyone calls their child’s year group ‘the Covid cohort’.

They all missed out on education and other formative experiences. But in my opinion the young people graduating from university this year have had the worst impact. A-levels pulled from under them, leaving home and half of their uni life under lockdown and now some of them not having their final exams marked.

Yes, I read that, am I not allowed to share my experience too? I do think it's more unusual for a child not to have settled within first term, in my experience of course, but every child is different.

@mirages08 I agree with you. DDs friend took an overdose on the way to school in May. She's actively self harming and she's still not been seen by CAMHS. The school has to watch her like a hawk, but how? Who's going to do that?

You are wrong (and I have a y9 child)
And I wish parents like you could spend just 1 morning in a secondary school dealing with the staffing crisis, no money in the budget, buildings literally falling apart, no outside agency help anymore unless the pupil has actively attempted suicide, and even then not fast enough, pupils who even 3 years ago would have been removed from abusive homes having to stay in an unsafe environment, taking food parcels to families, finding uniform and shoes for kids...I could go on and on.
MH issues have exploded since covid, and it's not just the kids'..parents seem to have lost the plot, too.
Totally unacceptable behaviour and abuse. We've had to ban some parents from the site.
Take today...
Should have 12 LSAs. We had 4. 4 agency staff didn't turn up. 2 on long-term sick.
3 SLT leaving in 2 weeks. There are no replacements yet. (Or at least no one we can safely hire)
Teachers are cleaning, doing cover, governors are exam invigilating...
Every child is a priority.
But you're complaining about a broken door when the house is on fire.

Yes, my current Y9 missed the end of primary stuff. Transition consisted of a booklet sent home - although they did bring the new Y7s and 12s in a day earlier than the rest of the school. He's had an overnight trip with school - missed his Y6 residential.
His younger brother - now Y7 - missed less.

However, I think we have been very fortunate with their ages. Yes, they have missed stuff - as have all kids. But I am mightly pleased that they had in face teaching for the fundamentals of phonics, writing and maths. They will (if the government funds things properly to stop the strikes) hopefully have uninterrupted GCSE teaching. That's 2 major things that i would have struggled even more to support from home than the stuff we did do.

I think it’s the government who washed their hands of their responsibility to find schools generally or catch up in particular to any vaguely acceptable standard.

My Y10 (Y7 in 2020) left school in March 2020 and wasn’t allowed to go back until September 2020. And then it was in bubbles and mostly in one classroom, not the normal secondary school experience.

Despite excellent online lessons and the teachers doing their best, it was a very tough time for friendships (nascent Y7 ones didn’t translate well to online, lots of misunderstandings and drama). And it took a while for her to gain confidence and independence outside the house again.

Not as bad as the exam years, I agree, but still had an impact.

Ace post.

“I agree that parents should be the main force in how well children cope, al things being equal.

However, things are not equal, are they”

There are things you can’t force equality in - like whether you’re working 10 hour shifts during lockdown or furloughed. But you can look at attitude now. You don’t have to be someone that focuses on residentials 2.5 years after your child missed it. If after 2.5 years they’re not settled - a residential wouldn’t have changed that. You don’t have to be thinking unhappy emojis about things they’ll never make up… it happened. There’s other cool stuff to do. My 2020 cohort child will never have the Y6 leavers show - she would have had a big part too, but no longer does drama so that was her last chance. She missed the country netball schools final - she’s not good enough now to ever qualify again. She didn’t do SATs. She was going to flipping ace them - full marks in most past papers, but she won’t be an all 9s GCSE student. I’m sure I could think of more! But o don’t! Because before, after - even during! - Covid - she has had and done cool stuff.

Every parent has an equal chance to focus on the future and the positive.

I don't see this as an issue. Many of the years have been disadvantaged in many ways. I don't think the current year 9's more so than most other years.

I don't think it's something anyone seems to forget. What makes you think people forget this?
There's simply nothing anyone can do. And actually it's very probable that there exist a child A that isn't worse effected than child b. I know them! Not everyone's parents are ones you want to be stuck at home with.
You sound quite bitter with the situation Op. Have you actually spoken to the school about this?

This! Every year was affected

That's lovely for you. Please read the first sentence of the post you're replying to. "I'm not sure, maybe your kid is different".

“They can't, can they? 🙁”

But why wallow in it?

Every kid doesn’t has something that another kid gets, nothing to do with Covid.

My Y9 doesn’t have any secondary meet and greet residential - because that’s simply not a thing in any school I know! And she doesn’t get to go on a school ski trip like her cousin - because they’ve never done them. And she doesn’t get to spend summer evenings on the beach, because we live in Birmingham.

Focus on what you can do with her.

Oh and the school was going easy on them and barely setting work until May break, which would have been great if I was home but DS was alone, isolated, and desperately needing some structure to his days! He was going out for a walk alone every day at my insistence, but otherwise just at home for the working day.

I agree with this, but I do think that some ages were more adversely impacted than others.

I have one y9 dc (so 2020 cohort as per op) and one y10 dc. Consider ourselves really lucky compared to those with under 7s or those in year 10 and above in 2020.

worst of all - those poor kids in year 13 in 2020 who are now having their exam papers unmarked.

I think that how well children dealt with it was largely down to how their parents handled it. If their parent had a ‘wow is me, woe is us’ mentality then they would have the same.

I had 2 children, a husband that had to reapply for his own job and a father diagnosed with stage 3 cancer at the beginning of lockdown. However, I want my children to grow up to be resilient when life is shitty so we made the best of it. They actually look back and remember lockdown fondly but it could have been so different had I been crying into my cornflakes every morning.

it’s honestly doing the children no favours still blaming Covid for everything now.

1500 kids so 300 per year? And they do a residential for the whole incoming year?!

Ds was year 9 and lockdown one was shit. He was home alone five days a week for six weeks while I worked (at still 13), then put into school with a dozen other kids for the rest of summer term. His friends parents were home and doing family things so he became very isolated and withdrawn. He was a bit better when sent into school but wasn't himself again until they went back properly in September. Lockdown two he was in school without a second thought about it!