Is your school making concrete plans to use other spaces?

[Blankiefan]

There's been lots of chat about how schools should be innovative and use other spaces to increase capacity when schools to back in August (e.g. have 25 kids with one teacher in a local sports hall rather for 5 days per week rather than 12 kids and one teacher in the classroom for only 2 days per week). Our school (in Scotland) has made no plans to do this despite some obvious spaces close to the school.

I'm interested to know if this is really happening anywhere or just a nice idea that will never work.

Not aware of any. Funding would be an issue surely?

Absolutely not.

Our school is in a deficit budget-unless money was already promised and definitely allocated, there is nothing we can do.

The government or LEA have not instructed heads to do this, nor have they said any money would be available for it.

Nope not happening.
And it's not even a "nice" idea either.

No. No money and the risk assessment would be so cumbersome...

Plus the lack of resources would be an issue.

And absolutely, this is not something that the government or LA have requested be considered.

Therefore, any school doing so would not have external support should anything go wrong.

Not worth the risk for most schools.

Our village primary head has got "agreement in principle" to rent the village community centre, a church hall and a scout hut. He's currently talking to the county council re using the village library but apparently they're dragging their feet and it took weeks to even get to speak to the right officer. He and the governors have been working really hard on contingency plans and hope to be able to "hit the ground running" when it comes to applying for funds to make it all happen.

No. I’ve enquired and got told even if there is a space they can use, they don’t have enough staff because they are needed for the years that are back in and the key worker classes. This is a private school.

If current class sizing is still in effect in September, ds school would require in excess of 60 extra classrooms & staff to teach them, they can't afford the staff they already had & were begging staff to leave or retire before the Covid crisis.

During consultation, our council said they were absolutely committed to investigating this. The guidelines published today make no mention of it.

"Hit the ground running?"
Hmm, where have we heard that phrase recently? Where pie-in-the-sky ideas came to nothing.
There will be no funding for this. In the same way as there is no funding for additional al cleaning materials for schools (unless there's an outbreak). Nor have the laptops for disadvantaged pupils materialised either.
Call me a cynic if you like, but I've worked in Education for more than 35 years. I know the harsh realities.

Literally had no communication from out school about this.

Lots of these empty places will themselves be starting to open up as lockdown lifts. Which limits the number of places left that you could move into.

There's risk assessments and insurance to think about first too.

But the government haven’t said this is the plan, have they?

If they have and I’ve missed it, please can you link, OP?

We rang the village hall but they no.

I don't have something to link to. It was discussed at an online consultation with the Education Team Manager for the cluster of schools we belong to. I was there as Chair of our Parent Council. They asked us what parents wanted to know and one of the other chairs asked the question. Their response in the session was apparently positive but it hasn't come to anything.

It won’t come to anything if it’s not in the government’s plan.

Schools would be utterly hung out to dry if something went wrong and they’d decided to do this all on their own.

The primary guidance is fairly clear that this should NOT be happening.

@Appuskidu is that the Guidance for English schools?

Of the 5 schools I've worked in most recently 2 have outright ruled it out because of logistics - they have a lot of children bussed into the school and the vast majority of the rest are driven to school. Bussing children to multiple locations just isn't going to be feasible, even if they magically had the cash to do so.

2 have "If we were given the money to hire them" plans, but don't expect to be given any funding to facilitate using any other spaces.

1 will be using the community centre, but that's because it's on the school site and they already share some spaces as it is.

We have a first school a middle school and a high school all within a short distance of each other. There are no other spaces nearby.

Our village has the school, scout 'hut', small library, church hall, village hall and a sports centre, all in a 15 min radius of walking. All risk assessed for use of groups of children- no idea why not being considered! Probably refused by Scottush Gov!

@TitianaTitsling

Our village has the school, scout 'hut', small library, church hall, village hall and a sports centre, all in a 15 min radius of walking. All risk assessed for use of groups of children- no idea why not being considered! Probably refused by Scottush Gov!

They may simply not have the staff to cover more spaces. One of the schools I used to work in has enough staff to cover 10 classes. Even if they had 500 spaces they still only have enough staff for 10 classes.

I don't understand why this can't happen. Yes of course I know that individual local authorities would find it too expensive, but given Nightingale hospitals can be put up in two weeks, then if the various UK governments prioritised education, this could be possible. I am really pissed off that my LA have proposed 4 days in school every 3 weeks - if social distancing is here to stay, there must be other solutions found.

I think part of the reason that schools and LA's won't do this now is because they've been offered no funding

If they somehow find money to scrape through then they'll likely be viewed in future as having had too much money in their budget to start with.

This needs extra money from the government to allow schools to have more staff and extra spaces if needed

There aren't any community spaces here, they are all privately owned. Playground is tiny so no chance of marquees etc. Our school had to fund raise to afford books and markers this year so doubt they could afford to rent anywhere.

I don't think many people realise how bad the funding situation has become for schools. Ours was practically begging for people to donate books this year.

@thereplycamefromanchorage

I don't understand why this can't happen. Yes of course I know that individual local authorities would find it too expensive, but given Nightingale hospitals can be put up in two weeks, then if the various UK governments prioritised education, this could be possible. I am really pissed off that my LA have proposed 4 days in school every 3 weeks - if social distancing is here to stay, there must be other solutions found.

Who is going to teach all these children? Who is going to pay for all these extra spaces (because you're going to need a hell of a lot more spaces than you did Nightingale hospitals)? How are you going to supply them all with things like internet, whiteboards, desks?

There are so many reasons why this can't work.