Could they get furloughed workers to help in schools?

[BlackWhitePurple]

We keep hearing that one problem with reopening schools is that there aren't enough staff to cover split classes.

Would it be feasible to ask now for some furloughed workers to help out in September? I'm thinking the likes of hairdressers, sports coaches etc who are unlikely to be back to work any time soon. If the government are still going to be paying furloughed wages (which presumably they'll have to, if the industries can't open), they could offer to pay 80% instead of 60% or whatever it is, do background checks now, and put some training in place to allow them to at least supervise groups of primary-school children. Also offer to pay SAHP the same amount if they help.

I'm thinking the school could then move, say, the older age groups (from primary) into, say, a village/scout/church/community hall, and spread the younger classes out over the remaining classes and assembly hall.

The teacher could then do the actual teaching, and then leave the class with the TA to complete work, and then go into the other classroom to teach there. An extra person in each class would help with supervision.

It's not ideal, obviously, but it would allow all pupils (in primary at least) back to school with social distancing in place. It would need money to be spent (to boost the furloughed workers' pay, add some SAHPs, hire halls etc), but they've already found billions, and it wouldn't be prohibitively expensive in comparison (plus it would allow taxpayers to return to work).

Obviously it wouldn't work for every school, but it would be a start for some.

It's not likely to go on forever (if everyone goes back to work then we either go back to normal, or Corona spikes again and we go back to lockdown).

Anyone have any other ideas for how things could work?

@WowLucky

I know schools have changed, I'm SLT "FFS' but it seems what we've done to adapt is tovastly reduce the value of what we deliver and there's little appetite to do better than that.

Other sectors have done so much more, even finding better ways than the old ones but education seems determined to not even try.

I think the biggest difference with other sectors is financial.

DH's work have been able to furlough a huge number of staff then spend the money they'd have spent paying them on laptops/home working set ups. Same with various other sectors. Furlough money, business loans and the likes have help sectors adapt.

Education has had nothing other than some extra cleaning money.

Several of the schools I used to work in have had "We can get all kids in half time if we can hire X number of TAs" or "We can get all the kids in all the time if we can have X number of TAs and hire Y space". I've had 5 "if I could get the budget for more staff would you be interested in work" calls, but the "if" has been a big one in every case.

In many cases they've actually lost money because they've lost income from letting out the hall or part of the building after hours - I chair a breakfast club and afterschool care that pays to let the school. We were also due to run a holiday playscheme over Easter and the same over summer. That's a huge chunk of money they don't have.

lyralalala
That's what I meant by appropriate classrooms. Before schools get onto staffing they need to have enough space to teach the students.

@lyralalala.

In many cases they've actually lost money because they've lost income from letting out the hall or part of the building after hours - I chair a breakfast club and afterschool care that pays to let the school. We were also due to run a holiday playscheme over Easter and the same over summer. That's a huge chunk of money they don't have.

I know of at least three local primary schools who will be losing a significant portion of their income this year due to lockdown. Income from lettings has dropped to zero. Some schools also employ their own canteen staff and have seen income drop there, although the kitchen staff have still had to work (and be paid) to provide lunches for keyworkers children and lunchpacks for fsm children before the vouchers kicked in. Considering that most schools in this area, we're already at the point of having to cut support staff in order to balance the budget, this is a huge loss as well as making it more difficult to have sufficient staff to run the school with the new guidelines in place.

As to the suggestion of using community buildings - there are 15 primary schools within a 1.5 mile radius of our school. Each of those would need the use of several community buildings. So, let's say, a minimum of 30 spaces. Each needs to be a suitable size, have sufficient toilet and handwashing facilities and an outside space for the children to get outside and play, do PE etc. They also need to either be within walking distance of the school, or if not, there needs to be spaces for parents to park when they drop their children off and pick up. Before lockdown, were told that as a school, we need to have a lockdown plan for the (admittedly unlikely) possibility of an undesirable person entering the building and putting children at risk. Would the community buildings need to meet the requirements? Etc etc. Whilst I have no objection principle to the idea, when you start to look at it as a serious possibility, there are so many obstacles. Unless we say that health and safety rules don't apply, which in my opinion is a slippery slope.

One of the biggest issues schools have is being directed by people who don’t have actual experience in the education field. Lots of stupid decisions are made because it sounds sensible on paper to the uninitiated but practically is insane. I’ve seen a lot of threads on MN from people who have ‘great’ ideas that sound ludicrous to anyone who actually knows what they’re talking about.

We want people are passionate in schools, not people who have been ordered to be there. We don’t run national service in this country OP and what you’re describing is an infringement on freedom.

Every other sector has changed it's operating model to find ways to continue or to improve what's it was initially able to offer, why not education?

Have you seen thread son here suggesting what gyms would do? Have you seen anyone suggest gym coaches are lazy staying at home doing nothing?
Has anyone seen a thread in pubs opening? I mean those landlords are sat around doing naff all aren’t they?

They could buy some land and have outdoor seating for bubbles and employ the lazy teachers to serve drinks.

They can source their own PPE and use throw away glasses and cutlery ...

Every other sector has changed it's operating model to find ways to continue or to improve what's it was initially able to offer, why not education?

Schools are adapting. They are working flat out to come up with plans that will work. They are planning new ways to keep children and teaching staff safe and provide meaningful learning. It is so much more complicated than just loading children into church halls.

One of the issues is that the UK has class sizes which are so much bigger than the rest of Europe so we do have different challenges.

We want to adapt, but at the moment we can’t even claim back the costs of additional cleaning. The DFE will only reimburse if we actually have an outbreak.

So how do we adapt when our budget is stretched already and now we have to magically find the funds for extra cleaning?

Schools are suffering huge financial losses right now. Our premises are rented out to a church, a cricket club, a dance school, a gym club, a football club, a tennis club.

There's no canteen income.

There's huge increase in cleaning staff costs and cleaning materials.

Cost of ordering signs, stickers, PPE, bins, shields for the office staff...

All with ZERO extra funding.

[quote Erictheavocado]@lyralalala.

In many cases they've actually lost money because they've lost income from letting out the hall or part of the building after hours - I chair a breakfast club and afterschool care that pays to let the school. We were also due to run a holiday playscheme over Easter and the same over summer. That's a huge chunk of money they don't have.

I know of at least three local primary schools who will be losing a significant portion of their income this year due to lockdown. Income from lettings has dropped to zero. Some schools also employ their own canteen staff and have seen income drop there, although the kitchen staff have still had to work (and be paid) to provide lunches for keyworkers children and lunchpacks for fsm children before the vouchers kicked in. Considering that most schools in this area, we're already at the point of having to cut support staff in order to balance the budget, this is a huge loss as well as making it more difficult to have sufficient staff to run the school with the new guidelines in place.

As to the suggestion of using community buildings - there are 15 primary schools within a 1.5 mile radius of our school. Each of those would need the use of several community buildings. So, let's say, a minimum of 30 spaces. Each needs to be a suitable size, have sufficient toilet and handwashing facilities and an outside space for the children to get outside and play, do PE etc. They also need to either be within walking distance of the school, or if not, there needs to be spaces for parents to park when they drop their children off and pick up. Before lockdown, were told that as a school, we need to have a lockdown plan for the (admittedly unlikely) possibility of an undesirable person entering the building and putting children at risk. Would the community buildings need to meet the requirements? Etc etc. Whilst I have no objection principle to the idea, when you start to look at it as a serious possibility, there are so many obstacles. Unless we say that health and safety rules don't apply, which in my opinion is a slippery slope.[/quote]
Our rent to the school boosts their budget by several thousand pounds a year. Instead of that they have a small token amount that they change for full-time use of a storage cupboard so we don’t need to cart everything every day.

Not only are they losing that, but they are trying to cover the mornings and afternoon care that we normally do. Amusingly, and annoyingly, the LA asked us to consider running again, but won’t let us use any of their premises. So how we were meant to do that I have no idea.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens with community spaces. We used to run our holiday playschemes in the community centre and were basically told by OFSTED that it was unsuitable as the room couldn’t be secured to prevent anyone coming in. There’s also no outside space and very limited toilets.

@lyralalala

You just couldn't make it up, could you! Our school is already under pressure because as an older school ,with multiple exits to the outside and with our special ific layout, it is going to cost a couple of hundred thousand £ to make us secure to the level required. And we just don't have that available - we struggle to buy the day to day resources as it is, we have cut staff to the bone and are losing money from lettings. Where that money will come from is anyone's guess. And then there are people on here blithely suggesting we get portakabins and the like.

Every other sector has changed it's operating model to find ways to continue or to improve what's it was initially able to offer, why not education?

Reading this post, something does clearly need to change about the way we teach our children to write...but I'm not at all sure you're qualified to have an opinion.

Such a shame we can’t have a discussion on how things could be made to work without snippy remarks about posters’ perceived ignorance of how schools work and then on to their literacy skills.

No, quite seriously, you need an education to understand how the process works.

I usually ignore errors if I see them but in this instance, while every man and his dog can have an opinion, it's highly important that they don't all get a say or we will end up with children going to daily childcare while parents huff and puff about the value of education.

[quote Erictheavocado]@lyralalala

You just couldn't make it up, could you! Our school is already under pressure because as an older school ,with multiple exits to the outside and with our special ific layout, it is going to cost a couple of hundred thousand £ to make us secure to the level required. And we just don't have that available - we struggle to buy the day to day resources as it is, we have cut staff to the bone and are losing money from lettings. Where that money will come from is anyone's guess. And then there are people on here blithely suggesting we get portakabins and the like.[/quote]
DS and DD's Head Teacher had to make the point that portakabins are simply not going to be available for every single school in the UK as well. Even if you suddenly grant schools the money and space for them.

Granted there are some individually stupid decisions being made. We have a new high school here. It was due to open fully after Easter. The old school building is structurally sound, it just wasn't big enough because of the house building in the surrounding villages. It's been used for the hub care until now. Would be ideal as extra space for both the high school and the two most local primary schools, but the council are adamant the demolition in the summer (which is over 18 months behind schedule already) must go ahead as planned.

I don't see how futloghwd workers with no experience of teaching or Woking in a schooll could do this. Or how it would work practically. Most furloughd workers will have no experience with children. A lot will come from the hospitality sector and no training at all in working with children. Why would you want people with no experience supervising your children?
Also the other huge issue is physical space. Not many shools have scout huts, libraries so close that teachers and makeshift teaching assistants can hop from one to the other also I honestly can't see how any education at all can take place in the situation you describe.

Nonnymum it wouldn't. But it allows people to have a dig at teachers and feel virtuous while doing so 😉

it wouldn't. But it allows people to have a dig at teachers and feel virtuous while doing so
Very true.

This is most interesting from the DfE. Updated today.

Primary schools should only welcome back additional children where:

<strong>they have already made provision available for children of critical workers, vulnerable children, and children in nursery, reception, year 1 and year 6 and have ensured as many as possible are able to attend (especially for those who would particularly benefit from being in school because of other disadvantage)</strong>
<strong>they can accommodate more children while still following the approaches set out in the protective measures guidance and their own risk assessment</strong>
<strong>They do not require additional funding, staff or classrooms to do so. If schools have access to space on other school sites</strong> <strong>(for example, local secondary schools, if that is feasible alongside the secondary offer) they may use this, taking care to ensure children stay in allocated groups</strong>. <strong>However, other community buildings (such as village halls) should not be used to expand capacity this term, while they remain closed in line with the government’s roadmap</strong>

So schools can only have children back in the numbers schools can fit on site and there's no additional funding.

I'm sure some on here will keep arguing mean lazy teachers don't want to work though.