Crumbling schools - really not good enough for our children - unsafe, freezing cold, damp...

[HarlaEB]

Panorama BBC now.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001vnjc/panorama-britains-crumbling-schools

@noblegiraffe you'll defo know more than me but when our primary converted we had new roof : Heaton

New roof, heating , corridors, playgrounds. Literally £millions.
It wasn't as bad as the examples on the show

Ours is okay now but used to have a major mice problem. There are dead mice under lots of the carpets/floorboards. Years ago one of the teachers went home and found a mouse in her handbag when she got to her house 😬😬😬

Even if they rebuild the school it isn’t always good news

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-67996302.amp

I worked in a school where a certain corridor and main entrance constantly stank of dead rotting mice as they had to permanently have traps and poison down the problem was that bad. They were all in the walls and under the floors.

It lends a whole new meaning to schools being unfit for purpose! Poor kids.

MATs don't get more per-pupil funding than LAs. Millions in refurbishment money was probably applied for.

The school near me has no kitchen and the kids have to eat in one small space or outside all winter. No science labs so GCSE kids are not getting to use a lab!
RAAC works initially funded by government grant. No guarantee of phase 2 to resolve and complete the work. Absolutely disgusting. I lived through the Labour years and Tony Blair said his priority was Education, Education , Education.

No way this parlous state of wasteful corruption would have happened under Labour. And of course it was Michael Gove who pissed millions of public money up the wall on free schools just to get one over on LAs and who didn’t allow funding for basic works to maintain schools. Appalling. The Tories have cut the money going to local authorities by at least a third since 2010. Of course this is a Tory problem.

The special needs school near me is so bad it’s been described as “Dickensian” by our MSP, but the council doesn’t have any money to build a new one. Poor kids.

Yeah when I got a new one I said "oh look, black."

Then I looked online and they're listed as 'blue'.

I think someone needs to contact the Health & Safety Executive urgently!!

This is due to lack of investment since the 2010. The state of the school's estate is shocking. https://ifs.org.uk/articles/decline-spending-school-buildings

I've taught in permanent portacabins where some of the children had to wear their coats all day from October to March because it was so cold. And on the flip side, they were boiling in the summer.

I've taught in a school that had a rat(s) who lived in the photocopier room and it was just seen as par for the course.

I've had a strip light fall on a child's desk (luckily not the child). I've had ceiling tiles fall (luckily not while children were in).

I've taught in a school where everything was online but the internet was appalling.

Don't even get me started on mouldy staff toilets (oh god the amount of mould) and the ingrained stench of pupil toilets.

My sons year 2 classroom used to flood on a fairly regular basis due to an issue with the roof, as it was a listed building, the work required was just too expensive. So the carpet was removed, hooks put on tables (so bags etc can be kept off the floor when wet) and lots of buckets and bins to catch the drips during the day.

Except things were a lot better under Labour. I've been teaching since 2002 and it was a LOT better before the coalition

It's interesting I'm up in Scotland and all of our local schools have moved into purpose built community campuses. Nursery to high school, public pool, public library, public gym. part time registrar, part time housing office. That way everything is contained within one modern building that's cheaper to run/ maintain. Letting the public pay to use the pool/ gym when not in use by the school helps to pay for it too.

Shocking isn't it.

Political mess.

We have a number of new schools. They have to be a MAT.

In the places these are opened, the existing schools have less children.
A local community primary has a PAN of 42 children, last year just 12 applied.

Yep, the new academy filled it's 30 new places!
Repeated locally in two more new school.

Millions spent on something not needed - to continue a political direction - whilst children are in crumbling schools.

@HarlaEB what area is that? In Manchester new schools opened then population of preschooler dropped significantly - spaces in primaries almost everywhere

Initially MATs and academies definitely gained financially but that's not really the case now.
Today I've had to decide between having a boiler replaced (big outlay using money I don't have) or replacing a TA who is leaving but who we really need to meet children's escalating needs. It'll also mean no midday supervisor for at least this term so I'll be doing that. Not that I can recruit new staff anyway...no applicants for the last two jobs advertised. I'm not going to lie, if the summer was round the corner I'd not replace the boiler.
The quotes we sometimes get for work are also ludicrous and for comparison we ask several tradespeople to quote separately. Sometimes the difference is staggering...repairing a leak for example. I'm talking four times as much. They must not want the work or think schools are loaded.