This government don’t give a shit about schools or your kids

[noblegiraffe]

AIBU to think that the government have fucked up literally everything to do with schools and education this year?

Evidence:

Chaotic school closures and keyworker provision (couldn’t decide what a keyworker was until the very last minute)

Forgot that kids on free school meals would go hungry so heads had to go round delivering sandwiches while the DfE put together an utterly shambolic voucher system that crashed and was pretty unusable.

Issued no guidelines for minimum education requirements during lockdown leading to vastly different provision between schools. Even Ofsted said they couldn’t judge schools on lockdown provision as there were no standards to judge them against.

Had to be shamed into u-turning on their insistence that free school meal children should go hungry during the holidays by a celebrity footballer (well done Marcus Rashford you absolute star)

Fed stories to friendly newspapers about schools re-opening in May to judge public reaction, leading to anxiety and uncertainty among parents and school staff

Announced that primary schools would open to all pupils before the summer holidays, an announcement that had surely not been run past anyone who worked in schools given that under the government’s own guidelines for schools for bubbles of 15 and no rotas, this would require double the classrooms and double the teachers available. Then backtracked on this a few weeks later (getting the friendly press to blame the unions) again creating uncertainty, anxiety and disappointment for parents and pupils.

Ignored education select committee questions about Ofqual’s algorithm when they raised issues in July

Lied and said they didn’t have early access to the data from Ofqual’s algorithm

When Scotland u-turned on their use of an algorithm, instead of making a considered response, came out with the bizarre notion that kids could use their mock grades - a suggestion that had obviously never been put past anyone who worked in schools. Again.

Took 5 days to realise that their mock suggestion created more problems than it solved, then u-turned on awarding CAGs creating problems for Y12 next year.

Fed stories to the friendly press that the unions are blocking the re-opening of schools in September so if it goes tits-up, they can blame them again (unions are asking for a ‘plan B’ in the case of local lockdowns, and for working conditions comparable to those of all other workers, no strike action has been proposed or balloted for so they couldn’t block re-opening even if they wanted to)

Blamed Ofqual for the algorithm they were told to create (prioritising statistics over teacher assessment)

Branded a teacher payrise that was agreed back in January a ‘reward for work during lockdown’, knowing this was incorrect, and deliberately fuelling outrage that they themselves had caused by having no minimum requirements for education in lockdown leading to vastly different provision.

Not funding this payrise so teachers probably won’t get it as otherwise it will lead to redundancies for other staff members due to having to fund it from already dire staffing budgets.

Issued guidelines that said that schools should reopen with increased cleaning schedules, increased handwashing, hand sanitising but providing no extra funding for this.

Instructed heads not to take any measures that would improve safety but would require more space (e.g. use of village halls) or not have pupils in full time (rotas, staggered timetables).

Didn’t realise that kids wouldn’t be able to get to school on public transport under current social distancing requirements as there aren’t enough buses until three weeks before schools reopened, and decided to throw £40 million to LAs to sort this (what? buy more buses?) so that they could blame the LAs when it inevitably goes wrong and kids can’t get to school.

And these are the people currently running a campaign to convince parents that they are capable of re-opening schools safely.

YABU: I have full confidence in the government and am perfectly happy with how things have gone so far

YANBU: It is mind-boggling how incompetent they have been, and how little thought they have given to the education of the nation’s children.

And yet people still love them

According to the poll, only 11% of MNetters love them enough to overlook the shitshow in education.

Obviously people don’t vote in general elections based on a single issue (usually!) so their terrible record on schools won’t necessarily massively affect polling numbers

BUT if it becomes an issue concerning not just education but competence, that could cause real problems for them. It’s becoming increasingly clear that they are not competent.

Thanks for the list noble. I prefer prime numbers so I’m glad your list ends at 31.

I voted YANBU, but agree that a substantial portion is incompetence rather than not caring.

I also feel I have every right to criticise the government despite not running for election. Because I’d absolutely love to run for election and have looked in to it. However, I cannot afford to quit my job on the off chance I might actually win. Perhaps if I had wealthy family or rich friends willing to sponsor me the potential of being unable to pay my rent and losing my home wouldn’t be so scary. But, in reality, the average working person just cannot actually afford to run for Parliament.

*The woefully inadequate amount of laptops provided didn’t arrive until the end of the summer term rendering them pointless.^

An ambitious project;
"by the 14 June 114,536 laptops and tablets had been delivered, or dispatched, to local authorities or trusts alongside 22,518 wireless routers"

while the DfE put together an utterly shambolic voucher system that crashed and was pretty unusable.

Despite the complaints;
"Tesco says it is not aware of widespread issues when customers redeem their vouchers in its stores."

I guess Boris Johnson and his ilk are a very good cure for imposter syndrome. Seriously, I think you could probably get a better PM by employing a similar approach to jury service, then asking competent civil servants to whittle down the numbers (of those who’d be willing to continue) and then vote on the final 10. At least someone might be elected who has had a normal career before and isn’t a graduate of Eton.
That was meant to be lighthearted.

FrippEnos
The government also turned down Microsoft and google for track and trace.

Quite a few countries made a U-turn on apple/google for track and trace. I'm not sure how well the apps are working across Europe now - Germany had problems the last time I looked - more technical issues and a download by only 20% of the population.

@Clavinova our schools never received all the laptops requested, we are now currently trying to find funding from other sources including parents to try and cover the shortfall of laptops we need.

Our schools also ended up giving out food parcels to parents instead of food vouchers due to issues with food vouchers.

Maybe it would be better asking teachers, SLT, governors what actually happened in their schools not repeating what the Government would like us to believe.

I don’t think I have seen one teacher on here say they received their full quota of laptops requested.

asking competent civil servants to whittle down the numbers

I wonder if that's part of the problem? The competent CS (and Tory MPs) have been purged by Dominic Cummings and been replaced with 'yes men' and 'weirdos and misfits' he even had eugenics supporters in his team. I remember when they were sending CS reports back to be rewritten because they weren't positive enough.

I am beyond disgusted at the way this has all been handled. To not provide funding for all the extras needed in September is a joke.

Issued no guidelines for minimum education requirements during lockdown leading to vastly different provision between schools.

Pretty sure that doesn't excuse the teachers and schools sending out one email a week with no feedback.

If ALL schools and ALL teachers had provided a consistent level and high quality of remote learning maybe the government wouldn’t have felt the need to rush everyone back to school?

@Clavinova
Despite the complaints;
"Tesco says it is not aware of widespread issues when customers redeem their vouchers in its stores."

Tesco wouldn't know about the issues with the system itself. The main issue wasn't that they couldn't use them (although some people did experience that). It was that they couldn't get them in the first place. Families had to wait weeks for the vouchers and school office workers / headteachers found that the system for getting the vouchers often didn't work and, when it did, it took hours and repeatedly crashed.

Why are you talking about Tesco using the vouchers just fine, Clavin when I’m talking about Edenred issuing them?

www.tes.com/news/coronavirus-anger-broken-meals-voucher-scheme

It’s a complete shambles. They need to come up with a solution and cash to help put this right. I don’t think young voters will be forgiving come the next election.

Clav - why are you just repeating govt propaganda?

No laptops received at all in a single school I know of (including mine).

FSM voucher online portal was still having issues until the LAST WEEK OF THE SUMMER TERM so schools were giving families vouchers themselves. (The helpline was a premium rate number that families could barely afford to use, too.)

@Lilybet1980

If ALL schools and ALL teachers had provided a consistent level and high quality of remote learning maybe the government wouldn’t have felt the need to rush everyone back to school?

If the Government hadn't suspended the curriculum and converted the function of schools from education to childcare (and with it removed any legal responsiblity that schools had to their students), the quality would have been more consistent nationally. Schools did what they were told to do by the people in charge of education. Schools and teachers providing anything were doing more than they were instructed to do.

I don’t think I have seen one teacher on here say they received their full quota of laptops requested.

Positive report from Manchester;

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/more-10000-laptops-tablets-routers-18537779

Pretty sure that doesn't excuse the teachers and schools sending out one email a week with no feedback.

What if that email contained a link to Oak Academy lessons for the week, the government’s own online school?

I am entirely sure that there were some schools offering inadequate provision during lockdown, just as there is outside of lockdown. The problem is, with the government setting no minimum standards, there was no way of intervening and improving standards. The normal way of doing this is via Ofsted, but even they said that in the absence of government standards there was literally nothing they could do about it.

@Lilybet1980

If ALL schools and ALL teachers had provided a consistent level and high quality of remote learning maybe the government wouldn’t have felt the need to rush everyone back to school?

If you used some critical thinking skills and looked at the government guidance you would see where the problem stemmed from and wouldn't be falling for the lets blame the teachers BS

Clav - why are you just repeating govt propaganda?

There is NOTHING this gov could do/not do that Clav wouldn't support. As evidenced by multiple threads.

Oh, good for Greater Manchester.

So, if the system worked for some people, it doesn't matter that it failed a whole load more?

Thus, if my school provides excellent home learning, feedback, pastoral and other support, it doesn't matter that others didn't?

@Clavinova

Issued no guidelines for minimum education requirements during lockdown leading to vastly different provision between schools.

Pretty sure that doesn't excuse the teachers and schools sending out one email a week with no feedback.

Schools had no legal responsibilities to the children who were at home as a direct result of what the Government decided. That didn't have to be the case.

Many schools did feel that they had a moral responsibility and so they did a range of things:

• provided reading materials for children at home,
• made available printed materials for children to use at home,
• communicated with children/parents via phone calls,
• ran digital platforms to enable students to be part of a digital classroom,
• recorded videos, audio files and created bespoke resources which could be used by children at home,
• prepared meals and food parcels which were then delivered to the families of their children,

And many other things.

If someone was personally unhappy with what their school provided than that's something they should take up with their school and give them their feedback. However, they shouldn't assume their experience was everyone's experience and should be prepared to be told that the school is satisfied with what they did given that it was above anything they were required to do.

If ALL schools and ALL teachers had provided a consistent level and high quality of remote learning maybe the government wouldn’t have felt the need to rush everyone back to school?

With respect, this is bollocks.

50% of my school do not have access to a device and/or WiFi.

We provided paper packs but that isn’t a substitute for being in school.

I could have been dancing the Charleston whilst reciting the complete works of William Shakespeare and HALF my kids wouldn’t have benefited.

We haven’t had a single laptop from the government scheme - what we have done is given a laptop to any Y10 into 11 who didn’t have one. Just in case they are needed next academic year.

The government have rushed the back to school plans because they have no clue what they are doing.

If we have stop start education for the next few months because these plans have been rushed, we won’t be able to deliver high quality content to all - because we’ll have the same issue as before.

If the government planned a blended model which allowed smaller groups getting content at school and consolidation work at home then that would be far less damaging to children next year.

Even just for term 1, whilst we see how number go.

Firstly, clav, you missed on here. Secondly, that does not confirm that is actually enough laptops for a very large urban area with pockets of high deprivation.. Thirdly, it's a press release so clearly of dubious no spin. lastly, the article plainly states that those are not all form the government : presumably because Manchester City Council established they hadn't provided enough. The DfE massively underestimated need, and THEN delivered them so late, some schools only just got them.

You found the exception to the rule. Although, not really, because the article is dated 6 July which is still Way Too Late.And Much Later Than Promised.

Amanda Spielman, head of Ofsted, in June pointing the finger at inadequate lockdown provision towards the DfE:

“ She said: "At this stage, routine inspections are suspended. And this is an area where at the moment there are no clear expectations for what schools ought to be providing.”

"Sometimes there is confusion about what Ofsted does – people think that we create the standards. We don't, we inspect against the standards that government creates.

"So what I have been saying is that we do need some clarity about those minimum expectations. Parents need them, children need them, schools need them.

"And as soon as those are in place then it will be possible to start assessing whether schools are in fact doing what they should be doing”

www.tes.com/news/coronavirus-ofsted-needs-clarity-inspect-schools-remote-offer

Your evidence for the one email a week comes entirely from MN. You have no skin in this game and are just platforming.