Back to school, back to work....

[User1123788363]

I’m struggling to see the issue with children with no underlying health issues returning to school and adults under a certain age with no underlying health issues going back to work.

Surely shielded people should stay shielded. Anyone who’s higher risk should be allowed to shield if they choose to and everyone else should be getting back to living their lives?

And yes the infection rate will likely go up but as long as shielded people are still doing just that then they won’t be exposed.

It feels like our children’s education and the economy are suffering massively because we’re locked down in solidarity.

Agree. Young people’s education and well being are being sacrificed to protect the small proportion of society who are at significant risk. I don’t mean to belittle that risk, but there has to be a better way to protect our vulnerable.

The money spent on the white elephant project that is the Nightingale hospitals would have been better spent on providing schools with extra temporary classrooms and cleaning staff.

1. Many people who can send their children (y6, y1 and yr) have chosen not to send their children to school despite the schools being ready to welcome them back in small bubbles.
2. secondary schools are preparing to do what they have been told to do by the government. In order to follow the regulations, students in Y10 will probably get some teaching one day a week in a small bubble. It won't be all their options as it is impossible to do that in bubbles. Again doubtless there will be some parents who choose not to send their children. One day a week of core subjects, not in their usual sets and with different staff will be of very limited value but again this is what the government have instructed schools to do.

If you want to get mad, get annoyed with the government and the health experts.

The reason for kids not going back in Scotland is it gives Sturgeon a chance to say "Look we are different".

My husband and DC all work in the City of London and have been WFH for the last three months. They would love to be back in the office with the camaraderie and jokes of office life rather than working in isolation but because overcrowded public transport is the only way they can make the 38 mile round trip every day it won’t happen any time soon.

Two of them have already been told their offices won’t reopen until January at the earliest and even then they will still WFH at least half the week.

Agree. Young people’s education and well being are being sacrificed to protect the small proportion of society who are at significant risk. I don’t mean to belittle that risk, but there has to be a better way to protect our vulnerable

This. People need to stay shielded, of course. Others need to be able to live their lives, work, be educated, keep the economy going.

The government have been slow and disorganised with everything. Lockdown should have happened a lot sooner and ended sooner in a managed, risk assessed way.

I think the person that sums it up precisely, for me, is Lord Sumption. Have a look at his you tube interviews if you get a chance.

He’s highly educated and very well respected both in his field and in general. Educated at Eton and Oxford and the highest judge in the land.

He basically talks about the hysteria surrounding coronavirus. Whether you agree with him or not, he makes some extremely good points.

The issue with schools is space. If you want to keep social distancing, then you need to triple the amount of space you have in order to bring in all years (if you want groups of 10-12). Schools are at and over capacity. There are over 2000 students in my school. I have 33 in some groups, and only 30 desks fit in my classroom. I have to hunt for desks every time I teach those group and then put the desks back when I am done because we dont have spare desks. How could we find enough rooms to split classes into 3 separate groups? Then you have to figure out how they move between classes in corridors that are 2ms wide. A one way system with 2000 kids moving at the sam time means major traffic. Teachers moving cany work as kids do chosen subjects so not every kid in a room would be doing the same subjects. Also, you need to triple your staff levels. We cant staff schools as it is. Nobody wants to be a teacher. Also, where do they eat lunch that give them 2ms space between each kid? It's a nightmare. If the government want social distancing to be in place, then schools physically cannot do it. There isnt enough space and there isnt enough staff.

I think it’s worth saying that our terms are different in NI, as they are in Scotland. In NI there are only 3 weeks of school left. In the place I used to live in Scotland, there are 4 weeks left. It really isn’t worth bringing the kids in for such a short time. Instead the schools are spending the time preparing for the “new normal.”

In the school I work in, our teachers have been in and out of school the whole way through lockdown depending on need. Support staff (librarians and technicians etc) are back in tomorrow full time for the rest of the term. More teachers are expected to be in too. The focus for the next 3 weeks before the end of term is to prepare classrooms and materials for the new normal in late August/September. I know I will be working every hour the school is open for the next 3 weeks to get things done.

My DC are in 3 different schools - 1 primary and 2 secondary. I work in a 3rd secondary, so between us all we represent 4 different schools. In our primary I know the teachers haven’t been doing a lot up to now (several friends who teach in the school who are frustrated at the limits the head has put on them) but are also headed back into school tomorrow for the next 3 weeks to prepare for the new term. The teachers in my older DC’s schools are doing the same. They are using these last few weeks of term to prepare the school buildings, make contingencies for transport, do the nightmare task of timetabling for part time school and continue to trial and test various methods of remote learning. I would far rather they were doing this than getting kids back in for 3 weeks of part time school for the sake of the appearance of normality.

Schools can’t go back unless they can go back as they were before lockdown (30 kids per class and no social distancing). They just don’t have the space or the staff.

Just wanted to reiterate that I have a lot of sympathy for schools/teachers in this. The almost impossible task of interpreting ever changing government guidelines while trying to provide an education and keeping both children and staff safe. Many teachers also have kids at home.

My kids are not going back to school until September, both are high school age. I can’t return to work because despite them being high school age they both have special needs (autism) and being a single parent I have no child care. It’s not as simple as “if people have no underlying conditions”, there will be teachers and staff with underlying conditions that can return meaning there’s not enough teachers to teach, even more so because they are only allowed 15 pupils in a class.

I’m doing a bit of work from home and I feel awful that I can’t return to my job whilst the kids are still off school but I can’t help the situation I am in.

Schools need to be allowed to return to normal, that would allow children to get an education.

The government isnt bothered about tens of thousands of packed in protesters, so all children should be allowed to return to school now.

Woke up today feeling despondent and furious.

Sick of hearing "schools have reopened'".. well yes of course they have unless of course your child is in years 2, 3 , 4 , 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 , 12 or 13.

Telling me whole schools of teachers are required to teach 3 year groups even with twice the number of classes does not wash.. Schools trotting that out as an excuse for teachers not delivering distance learning ( and some are) should be having a proportionate amount of funding taken away for children in those years being g entirely unchartered for. Perhaps that would concentrate the minds of SLTs.
That's why private schools are taking such a can do attitude to distance learning.. because they know they'll start losing fees if they don't ( and a lot of them are giving discounts on fees at the same time)

My nephew is in one of those appalling schools where the SLT seem to have instructed teachers not to bother about any child who isn't a key workers or perceived to.be vulnerable. before anyone trots out the contact the school" suggestion, they have done so loads of time and nothing happens they just get an email saying its
not f*cking practical and directing them to Oak Acadamy and bite size. except now said school is posting on facebook about how wonderful if it they are open again..no much flipping use to DN in year 4. Luckily he has bright educated parents and even more luckily his mum is on maternity leave but then of course looking after a 4 month old baby and home educating a reluctant 9 year are totally compatible and my brother is working from home full time.

The government need to pull themselves together and requesition church halls, sports halls and marquees across the land and get children educated even of its on a rota system for now.

This is a complete debacle with teaching unions and government messing up children's futures.

Do you think there’s and element of the government trying to stay in favour with the older voters?

I agree with you. Part Time school is not going to help me get back to work and I’m sure it’s the same for most working parents. I think those at high riak should shield but this blanket lockdown can’t continue for everyone

If it was possible to reopen schools pretty much as normal I'd be happy to send my children who are in Y3 & Y8 back now. Any teachers with underlying health issues or who live with anyone at risk could continue to wfh and any parents who need to for health reasons, or who would just prefer to home school could continue to do so.

The risk to children and healthy adults is low, I feel it is more damaging (to the economy and to peoples health) to continue as we are than it would be to attempt to get back to normal, obviously with some precautions in place.

What SquidgeBum said.
I fully sympathise with people wanting their kids back in school, but unless you just forget social distancing altogether, I honestly don't understand how people think it's possible. You simply cannot summon up double or triple the number of teachers and classrooms out of thin air. And even if you could, year 10 upwards all do different combinations of subjects with different teachers and different classmates, so bubbles are totally impossible.

I'm fed up with people putting this down to a lack of drive or imagination on teachers' parts. a) Imagination and drive don't cancel out reality or the laws of physics and b) It's not teachers who are making the decisions anyway.

(Not accusing you of teacher bashing, OP - it's just frustrating when many people don't see why we can't just go back to normal.)

Agree. My DS is Year 2, he hasn't gone back yet. He probably won't go back until September and that may only be part time apparently! He's not getting a proper education. I cannot do my job from home, so I cannot go to work until school is open.

Oh dear I am angry. Yes I can see there are practical reasons that doubling up numbers of classes must be hard but except in very small schools it surely should not take every teacher available.

@lazylinguist I'd be happy to send my children back with very limited social distancing in place. So maybe staggered start and finish times, packed lunch's in the classroom and as much outdoor learning as possible but generally just back to normal and not having to sit 2m apart from each other.

@listsandbudgets in every school every teacher works their full hours all the time. Nobody is sitting around. The minute you up the class groups, you need more teachers. For my school, bringing back 2 years 4 days a week (original plan) took the entire department of staff. We dont have spare teachers lying around that can just magically appear when you suddenly need 50 teachers as opposed to 25.

On the continent they seem to be going with 1m - 1.5m. Of they applied that here it would free up quite bit of space

I think the same OP, I'd be happy to send mine back with limited social distancing, fed up of the juggle and the virus isn't going away.

Interesting point about keeping older people happy to benefit the political party.

@listsandbudgets it would maybe mean you only need twice the amount of classrooms and staff as opposed to triple but when you have a school that uses 95% of its space and 100% of its contractual staff hours on a normal day that's still impossible. Its like needing 500 beds and 80p staff in a hospital that only has 250 beds and 400 staff. It's a simple physics issue. You cant magic it out of air.