To think this school's plan won't work

[Poppi89]

I work in a secondary school ( not as a teacher) and we have been kept up to date by email and zoom staff meetings.

There has been a lot of talk of when we will re-open and what will happen as like most schools it was very stressful closing the school and not being prepared so they are trying to put plans in place and keep one step ahead.

Due to a lot of parents in the area wanting the school to re-open and for life to go back to 'normal' they think the government might re-open schools sooner rather than later maybe before May half term, so the school has put in place an outline of what will happen:

• School will re-open but will continue sticking to the guidelines of social distancing - as this is not possible in a school with full capacity students will be split into halves or thirds to ensure they are spaced far enough away from each other. This means that the kids will only be in 1/2 days a week.

• Due to adults spreading the virus more than children (it seems) they don't think all staff should be in each day. So will be depending on parents to do a rota system - so one qualified member of staff to 2 parents to supervise.

Does anybody else think the school would be better to remain closed if this is the case?
It seems they won't be learning much and the risk of getting the virus will still be high.

I do get that this is the best plan they have come up with to keep everyone happy. My DD is missing her friends and wouldn't mind going back to school a couple of days a week and I guess it will be easier for parents to get back to work but I would rather wait until June/July at the earliest as surely the NHS is still overwhelmed.

What do you guys think?
AIBU - thinking this isn't a good plan

@2ndStar - most of the school staff are also parents and a lot including myself are single parents. My DD will have to go in to her school ( a different one) on the days I am working, so someone will need to supervise her so I can supervise someone else kids - it seems ridiculous but then if the kids are at home full -time the parents can't go into work at all whereas if they are in 2 days the parents can work 1 and a half days and then supervise in the school the other half day/day. - I honestly don't know but at the moment there would not be enough staff to pupil ratio and if all the staff do go in - then if a few of them get sick there won't be enough adults for the school to be open.

The message at today's Gov talk seemed to be that when it is safe for children to go back then they will but that schools were never closed because of risks to children as children are pretty safe but more because parents mingle and collect them and take them to school kind of thing.

I would assume they're reacting to parental pressure and saying "well fine, we can open but it will need parents to staff it. What, you don't want to/can't/won't? Not that easy is it, we'll stay closed as per govt guidelines then."

This would be funny if that was the case. I might suggest they tell parents just to see how many really want their kids to go back and not just because they are getting on their nerves haha

handful , I'd more like to know where your 90% comes from. My surveys were widely reported, including in The Times yesterday. One of them was an IPO Mori poll.

I suspect this is the same 9% of parents that demand all kinds of unrealistic things from the school.
My kids are not going back anyway. And this is a ridiculous suggestion of how to do it.

IPSOS

@Xenia

You might want to let the SLT in your school know about this:

In the paper, published in the British journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases, the researchers said: 'Notably, the rate of infection in children younger than 10 years (7.4 per cent) was similar to the population average (6.6 per cent).
There was no significant association between the probability of infection and age of the index case.'
This meant that children were as likely as adults to both catch the virus and to spread it.
The researchers added: 'Analyses of how cases are detected, and use of data on individuals exposed but not infected, indicate that infection rates in young children are not lower than the population average (even if rates of clinical disease are).'

This is batshit. If only half or one-third of the pupils are in at a time along with possibly half of the teaching staff why do they need twice as many parents as staff in order to open the school? Why is a teacher not capable of teaching/supervising a class as normal? And if there aren't enough staff to go around all classes how is throwing a parent or two in there instead going to help?

Also how is life going to be back to "normal" for these demanding parents if their children are only in a few days per week and they have to be on a rota to go in and supervise them anyway?!

I wish one of these questioners on the panel would ask these experts to define 'safe'. This word opens up all sorts of issues for schools if children, parents , or staff fall ill, or worse.

Sorry but I would not be going in to a school to supervise other peoples kids! I have my own job to do, this the teachers job and what they get paid for. Why should I be infected so they are not. Also my kids would not be going anywhere near a school that has unsupervised and unqualified parent helpers in you have know idea who they are or there backgrounds it’s a major safeguarding concern.

I think the fact is that things are not 'normal' and they might not be for a very long time. So it is finding a new normal to try and get close to the old normal as possible. I think a lot of parents think that the schools will re-open and be like it was a couple of months ago but it is not possible.

If we have half the kids, and half the staff, how would we have half size classes?

Parents will have to continue to suck it up then.

Most Year 7s and Year 8s should be able to get on with their work by themselves. Even my Year 6 can.

@Apple40 - I think it is because some parents are pushing for schools to go back to normal - as there is not enough staff/ they don't want all the staff in at the same time - then they will need other adults to come in. So their logic is to share childcare with the parents.

I assume it'll be a bit like brownies. All parents have a rota and they go in and volunteer alongside the other staff.

What do you mean @nellodee

Are all the parents DBS checked?

Secondary school is neither childcare nor Brownies!

This is one of those bollocks statements that people come out with to say someone they know...my friend - who's a headteacher says

It's all crap, people. OP - if you do work in a school then you realise you've just committed gross misconduct for publishing confidential school plans on an open forum? You do understand that if this is actually true that you can be easily identified by the fact that your head teacher is the only professional in education who doesn't know anything about safeguarding and seems to think he can get random people without an enhanced DBS check into school to supervise his students.

No one, surely, is that stupid.

If they haven't got adequate staff to open and do what a school is meant to do, it sounds as if there is no point in them opening at all. If there is any prospect of reopening before that situation changes (which frankly seems unlikely) then they need to ensure that the local authority and Department for Education are informed so that alternative arrangements can be made.

Most Year 7s and Year 8s should be able to get on with their work by themselves. The work is not a problem, it's the isolation and withdrawal. I wouldn't care if my child wasn't being taught at school, just getting on with the work for each subject the same as they do at home. I just want them to get out of the house and be with other people, see their friends, have a face to face conversation. I am so worried for them.

Half days is a really bad idea. If the suggestion is parents can also return to a socially distanced workplace, half days stops them doing that. Also disruptive to education. Better full days, but I suspect it’s so they don’t have to do breaks and lunch.

OP - if you do work in a school then you realise you've just committed gross misconduct for publishing confidential school plans on an open forum?

Nonsense. We have no clue what school OP is talking about, or whether she's changed salient details.

you can be easily identified by the fact that your head teacher is the only professional in education who doesn't know anything about safeguarding and seems to think he can get random people without an enhanced DBS check into school to supervise his students.

As OP didn't say that was the plan, but did say that staff members would supervise, this is irrelevant.

Madness and totally unworkable to have a parent rota in a school! And surely bringing in loads of random adults is a higher risk of spreading the virus anyway?! Not to mention the safeguarding risk!

Having a fraction of the school attending at a time sounds more likely. Although will be a logistical nightmare for the school.

@unfortunateevents - my school like some others I know are only providing childcare at the moment. To make it fair to those studying at home the ones going into school are getting the exact same work and often a subject specialist is having to supervise a different subject so there is no actual teaching taking place.

I've just been talking to a friend in Germany (Lower Saxony) and she says that her two (secondary aged) children are returning to school on 18th and 25th May respectively. They are splitting the school in half and having half in for a week and then the following week the other half go in.

That could work (though my friend is fairly concerned that the infection rate will start to rise again). I can't see how having parents in to help supervise (DBS checks anyone?) is remotely helpful. And once again a school has failed to recognise that parents have to earn a living and are probably not available.