Are our kids being thrown under the bus

[Pixxie7]

Chris Whitney has said that children are safe to go back to school because they are at low risk of complications from Covid.is this another case of politics being more important than lives?

We will get more guidelines and advice issued at 5pm Thursday just before bank holiday when lots of schools have inset on 1 Sept.

Shambles!

The Unis could be helping to support secondaries with advice, secondaries could be circulating to primaries.

From one of my links;

"The Ed Tech Demonstrator Programme includes a network of schools and colleges across England who exhibit effective practice in the use of technology."

"The programme was announced last year to boost peer-to-peer support on the effective use of technology and has now been tailored to help schools and colleges provide education remotely."

edtech-demonstrator.lgfl.net/

I've never heard Chris Witty say anything that wasn't reasonable!

More government bull I expect. Or something that will be funded to a few favoured private academies - favoured meaning nepotistic rather than through any real merit - and quietly go missing with no improvements on the ground to be seen.

Does anyone with real knowledge know what the definition of “children” is, please?

Our youngest, 17 years old, second year A level student, due back in College next week.

“Child”, all 6ft 3 of him, has asthma and his very vulnerable dad needed to shield and will work from home ad Infinitum. “Child” has seen no-“one but household since early March.
.
Where does this leave people like us?
(Of whom, I am certain, there are many)

More government bull I expect.

Instead of being so negative why don't you ask your school to sign up -
"click here to request support from a demonstrator school/college"

Does anyone with real knowledge know what the definition of “children” is, please?

In Alabama it's 24 apparently.

@LouiseNW

Does anyone with real knowledge know what the definition of “children” is, please?

Our youngest, 17 years old, second year A level student, due back in College next week.

“Child”, all 6ft 3 of him, has asthma and his very vulnerable dad needed to shield and will work from home ad Infinitum. “Child” has seen no-“one but household since early March.
.
Where does this leave people like us?
(Of whom, I am certain, there are many)

It leaves you in complete limbo. As it leaves all teachers we are clinically vulnerable and/or shielding. Because the Gov have lifted shielding they have lifted any protection a teacher may have had if they wanted to request a different way of working. When I have mentioned to my college that I was (am!! it’s not give away!) heir response is to repeat Gov guidelines - which are that there is no such thing anymore.

Many typos there. My apologies

Clavinova

In Alabama it's 24 apparently.“

Yes, thank you 😂

*Alabama reported children as ages 0-24 in the Children and COVID-19:
State Data Report.

MovedByFanciesThatAreCurled

Thank you. It doesn’t help, but I was seriously beginning to wonder if we were the only people in this situation with the charge back to education, for everyone.

Thank you for what you are doing. Have to admit, were I a teacher I would be considering early retirement very seriously indeed. The disregard for your welfare is shameful.

Clavinova.

Oh my goodness. I thought you were joking!

Marsha It’s not happening here. It’s not being discussed with two weeks to go

...thats my point! though i believe the opposition and teacher unions have raised it.

@majesticallyawkward

"While I do feel for teachers and school staff who are vulnerable or have vulnerable family members, I don't see how they are different to everyone else who either worked through lockdown or is now returning to work."

There are a few differences. If you've been shielding, you haven't been working throughout, as you say, we are returning to work.

The difference is I can't think of another profession where you are actively discouraged from wearing masks etc, yet are in contact with, in my case, about 500 pupils a week, for an hour at a time in a relatively small space. I could be wrong, but I can't think of another profession where this is the norm?

Also the footfall, in a secondary school at least, they have hugely underestimated.
I've finished shielding, I have to go back. I'll keep a safe space at the front of the classroom and hope.

It's the inconsistency that irritates me. I don't want masks in school as it happens, but it irks that you need a mask for 1/2 hour in a huge supermarket, yet not in a small room. Yes the risk to children becoming seriously ill is thankfully low. Spreading it not so low.

I've contemplated not taking my immunosupressants, but that would leave me unable to work and now vulnerable anyway. It's between a rock and a hard place.

@StaffAssociationRepresentative is that true re. expecting guidelines to be issued on Thursday? The silence from Ds's school (primary) is deafening on the basis that they were waiting for further guidance (ds doesn't even know which teacher he has next year), but I understood from a teacher friend that all guidance has been issued and no more is expected.

Israeel opened schools, look what happened there

@Sh05

Israeel opened schools, look what happened there

And US, South Korea, Germany!!

@Sh05

Israeel opened schools, look what happened there

UK schools are magic, silly billy!

@MovedByFanciesThatAreCurled

So a nursery worker sees over 200 kids a day? A train driver has to spend up to an hour in close proximity to their passengers? People are happy to buy in to the narrative perpetuated by the government that teachers think they are exceptional and that they some how think they are special. Most of them don’t. Most of them just want it accepted that their circumstances are exceptional and that the Gov has offered them little to no help in helping to protect those most vulnerable.

What trains are you getting on that the driver is anywhere near the passengers? Train guards maybe but not the drivers, then are guards on the trains at the minute, I hadn’t seen one for months prior to March. What nurseries have 200 kids?

We were wandering around a smallish city on Saturday and all but one of the police (small protest nearby) were wearing masks.

*I find when speaking to family and friends that there are broadly speaking two groups:

1. relatively well off (house + garden, laptop for each child), parents WFH and can to some extend support the learning. These tend to fret a lot about the reopening of schools

2. less well off, not having IT equipment for each child, lone parents, children with SEN. In many cases, these children had often much less of an education that then other group and struggled much more also with MH stuff*

In a more equal society, or one where there were measures to mitigate some of the effects of inequality, like providing laptops and broadband to less well-off families, life in lockdown would have been a lot less damaging for disadvantaged children.

It makes me bloody angry, tbh. TPTB have no idea how shit things can be for families who are hard up.

Jenny Harries is on now. Didn't she say indoor spaces were a problem not outdoors.

Polling suggests that the better off families are more likely to send their kids back to school than the disadvantaged families.

@noblegiraffe

Polling suggests that the better off families are more likely to send their kids back to school than the disadvantaged families.

I agree with this rather than pp

Polling suggests that the better off families are more likely to send their kids back to school than the disadvantaged families.
This, definitely. Kids that went back when schools reopened in summer were predominantly from better off families From what I saw in our town, with private schools (same rules and class sizes at that point!) having almost full attendance And the most disadvantaged schools having very low attendance