There’s now a strong chance schools will NOT go back full time in September

[Redolent]

Schools have been set up to fail by the careless summer relaxation of lockdown.

• No mandatory face masks in shops and indoors. The UK is an international outlier here.
• Reduction of 2m rule to 1m which is basically the normal distance people talk to each other. Factor in alcohol and social distancing is now non-existent in pubs and restaurants. Oh, and nobody cares about the 1m ‘plus’ bit. They just hear 1m.
• Reopening of too many indoor venues at once, including things like places of worship which are high-risk for transmission anyway.
• Bypassing the idea of social bubbles straight to unlimited two household meet-ups indoors. You can visit different pubs/restaurants over the weekend and go inside multiple households throughout the week. Zero attempt to break chain of transmission.
• No functioning app and poor test/trace system (see SAGE’s Stephen Reicher on the latter)
• ‘Pausing’ of shielding in August

All of the above will led to a rise in cases.

Meanwhile:

• Shit is absolutely hitting the fan in the United States, India, Pakistan, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, other parts of the Middle East. Our quarantine policy is so terrible it may well be scrapped anyway. Will see more imported cases.
• The weather will turn cooler and allow perfect conditions for the virus to thrive

So by end of August/early September, our cases and hospitalizations will be rising significantly. Flu season will kick in. The NHS is already groaning under the weight of its huge 10million waiting list - another shut down cannot happen. A full time return to school under those circumstances will be untenable. Blended learning will see a turn as will part-time schooling.

YABU: we need to get the economy going in all its forms as quickly as possible, and schools will also go back with no issues.
YANBU: you cannot have things both ways. This summer relaxation is setting us up for an autumn/winter spike and more part-time schooling.

I did say so myself larry but of course no head signed up for the job asking if they could cope in a global pandemic.

Do you honestly honestly believe the DfE has offered anything approaching clarity and leadership? If they are out of their depth, then how can a headteacher of one school have so much expected of them? the guidelines cannot just be ignored.

I am being stubborn because it is galling on all these threads to be 'set straight' by many posters who do not work in education, never have, and yet feel they can sort out all the multiple and complex issues facing schools in one post.

I honestly don't think - perhaps hospitals aside- there are more sprawling and complex institutions than secondary schools.

Some heads are brilliant people and brilliant leaders : Simon Smith springs to mind and he is crying out for clarity on Twitter!

Piggy, it’s a global pandemic, who did sign up for it exactly?

I agree about the Leaders v Administrators that Larry mentioned.

Piggy,

No one is offering any clarity, because they have none themselves!

The DofE have effectively given a nod and a wink to heads to get on with it as best they can.

No leader signed up knowing they would have to deal with Covid, least of all Boris(!) who has, in my opinion, proved to be a terrible ‘wartime’ leader. But when you join the SLT, it is behoven upon you to understand that the ‘ L’part has a meaning, other than an office and very little actual teaching.

Well, maybe people who work in public health, virologists , and the CMO mary!

I genuinely am not disagreeing with that 8larry* but I think we have different solutions. Leadership comes form above and this are layers of leadership above headteachers.

To be honest, in a desire to prove themselves 'macho' (and it is mainly men, although some women, there are heads who have joined in a pissing contest and played fast and loose with the guidelines. There are heads who have flagrant disregard for H and S , workload etcand think it is a badge of honour : there does need to be a checking mechanism.

I will repeat that schools in other countries did need a safety inspection. I don't see why that's an outrageous requirement. My school could certainly do without its own leadership team signing off all the so called H and S checks. If there is an annual fire inspection, why not an inspection for this?

I think it’s a weak excuse though when for example the NHS has been completely refigured almost overnight but yet education is floundering around still even now and into September, trotting out the elf n safety line.

Surely adult professionals paid £70k a year can do much much better than this?

TyphoidMary2020

A lot of the NHS is still "closed" or reduced. Yet this is hardly ever pointed out.

As for being on £70K WTAF

Piggy,

I don’t think we are too far apart here. I guess I think that Heads are battlefield generals, whereas you see them more as captains.

I also suspect that I don’t see Covid as scary as you do, although I am of an age where it could damage me, and I know several who have had it and were pretty ill (none hospitalised though).

Typhoid,

I don’t think any head would come to work for less than 100k today (or very few) and some are on a lot more.

I am talking about Headteachers re £70

NHS staff have been redeployed to focus on the COVID response where their usual roles are not currently a priority, not being in work because of health and safety isn’t happening, even shielding staff have work to complete from home.

I am not saying nhs is perfect by the way.

Piggy,

Also, schools do have governors, who should be chosen for their expertise in various fields (admittedly probably not virology or epidemiology). They should also be working with the heads and supporting them.

Really Larry? Even Primary Heads?

That’s even worse!!

Larry,

A very brief Google finds this:

www.tes.com/sites/default/files/headteacher_teacherpayscale_03b.pdf

It certainly doesn't suggest that 'very few are coming to work for less than 100k'

Typhoid,

I am not an expert. Maybe outside SE, very small school...The adds are pretty googlable, though.

www.nasuwt.org.uk/advice/pay-pensions/pay-scales/wales-pay-scales.html I know a few Welsh primary headteachers and they're mostly on £40-60k depending on school size. I don't know any on more than £70k and the ones in the top end are very few and far between.

Can’t,

Hmm, maybe I am wrong here (I know secondary, London, so I am clearly biased).

However, I also wonder whether those averages are total comp (including benefits, of which there are many) or just base salary.

@larrygrylls you are wrong about salaries for head as @cantkeepawayforever has pointed out.

Larry, a further google suggests that the average pay for a head is around £55k

[https://www.payscale.com/research/UK/Job=Head_Teacher/Salary]]

Obviously, that average is made up of a large number of lower primary headteacher salaries per each higher secondary salary, but it certainly doesn't indicate that 'most' heads are on £100k plus.

I would say that the only other benefit to be included would be pension. I know of no other usual benefit? Certainly things like healthcare, car allowance, bonus etc often added to private sector salaries do not apply in state education.

Sorry,
www.payscale.com/research/UK/Job=Head_Teacher/Salary

Sorry but that elf and safety line speaks volumes. Health and Safety is extremely important. It is reprehensible in a public health emergency to sneer at public health.

The NHS closed whole departments down, changed PPE rules (not entirely successfully due to various procurement issues), reallocated staff, and were fully funded (and supported by businesses and the army) to build the Nightingale hospitals.

Education gets nothing like that attention or investment.

At least 800 school leaders are being paid £100,000 in the current academic year, up from 700 just 12 months earlier, it emerged.
Figures from the Department for Education show that 200 heads are receiving salaries of more than £110,000.
In all, around a quarter of secondary head teachers are now receiving six figures.

In 2013 it was a quarter, The Telegraph. May have changed. Average was the £55k then still

even shielding staff have work to complete from home. : I don't get your point here. So do shielding teachers. Why wouldn't they?

OK but Headteachers are paid relatively generously to fulfil their presumably Leadership role, blaming the Government doesn’t stop the world needing to keep going?

Children are missing out on social contact, their mental health is suffering.

Extremely limited childcare now and into summer will impact on other areas because Parents have to pick up the slack.

Boris has changed the law re NHS and somebody pointed out on another thread that the role of schools has also been changed to cover care and education during a global pandemic, some schools are not taking this on board, yet wonder why Parents are frustrated?

Is it really so difficult to understand?

I don’t begrudge that pay at all btw. I just googled the head of one of our schools and his background is impressive. He’s rising to the very difficult challenge and it reflects that.

I'm worried about a second wave, the current outbreak was at the end of winter, if we get a second wave starting November/December, it could be worse than the first wave & schools could end up closing again for three months plus.