To feel in despair for the kids

[JudesBiggestFan]

My son was one of 400 children sent home from two bubbles in his high school today to isolate for 14 days. He's in Year 7 and it was his fourth day in his new school.
He'd been catching the bus, made a new friend, had settled in so much better than I hoped after the past few chaotic disrupted months. And now he's home again.
Not only that, he is now going to miss his cricket presentation and first two football matches of the season, not be able to see friends and family, all for the pleasure of three days of schooling.
And I can see this happening over and over and over again. Luckily childcare isnt an issue as I work from home, but I'm just so sad for kids missing out. Six months off and it seems we're back where we started with no end in sight

It just feels wildly disproportionate to be keeping 400 most likely healthy children away from their education, social life and sports for yet another two weeks on the off chance they have the virus. It feels like we have the worst of all worlds here...a half hearted, too late lockdown that didn't eradicate the virus yet has caused an economic crash. The second we've all gone back out again the virus was still right there, waiting.
And I have three children, in preschool, year 4 and year 7, all different institutions. The winter ahead looks dismal with lockdowns over and over again fir all of them. I just feel completely helpless to give my kids the education I would have wanted to and always prioritised. I just wish I could trust the government knew what it was doing. Fat chance!

I can imagine how frustrating it must be, I feel really sorry for kids who’ve waited months to go back to school and then get told to go home for two weeks. It’s ridiculous in my opinion, we can’t carry on like this indefinitely.

The vast majority of youngish, healthy people recover fine from this, I’ve had it and I’m fine. I know sadly that isn’t the case for everyone but it would be better to tell elderly/vulnerable to take extra precautions and the rest of us go carry on. The reality is that it isn’t ever going to go away so you either take your chances or live like this for years

@Mustfly for mine 8 and 5 it's the social aspect I think I'd be more worried about as that's impossible to replicate at home. I'm not saying our homeschool was a top quality ofsted outstanding institution (ahem) but we cobbled it together with my retired teacher mum's remote help and plenty of reading. It wasn't perfect but neither was it utterly shambolic. But seeing them go back to a proper school environment run by professionals has made me realise how very wrong denying them the company of their peers is.

AlexaShutUp it would be njce if we could discuss this without using aggressive language (screw over for example). I know people who are 70+ or who have health concerns, I have no desire to spoil their lives.

Point taken, but I'm just fed up of people making the assumption that those who are more vulnerable (and their families) should somehow put their lives on hold while everyone else just goes back to normal. We are not only talking about the over 70s or a tiny minority of seriously ill people - we're talking about a significant chunk of the population, many of whom are perfectly healthy on a day to day basis, and who lead perfectly ordinary lives. Should these people really have to sacrifice everything so that those who are blessed with no health issues can just get on with their lives as they please? What about education for their children? We are in danger of creating a whole swathe of second class citizens if we go down this path.

As for the suggestion of reducing subject range and presumably teaching in huge class groups due to staff shortages, crammed into tiny classrooms...I don't feel that this would be the kind of education that I would want for my dd in any case. I would far rather have a blended learning approach, with a mixture of high quality online and (socially distanced) class based learning that would enable kids to follow a full curriculum without putting people at such high risk.

@Weallliveinagreensubmarine

Agree I would have been very keen on part time school and smaller classes!

Me too! Not that I ever got asked.

OP are they being sent home because someone in the bubble has tested positive? Or because someone in the bubble has symptoms?

If the latter this seems overkill and definitely not the approach I have heard of from other schools.

Sorry to here this. Mine are in GCSE years too, year 11.

I'm prepared as far as it goes for our situation to change from one day to the next. Guess we should be glad we are okay,

My coping strategy as far as possible is to stay organised.

YANBU - the children and young people of this country have been let down by the government. It was clear that with low numbers in June and July, they could only reopen schools safely if they didn't reopen pubs, bars, non-essential holidays to foreign places. But they have reopened almost everything before the schools went back and virus numbers have been creeping up for weeks. This was entirely foreseeable and the government simply did not prioritise the pupils' education. Also they did not plan or prepare for the inevitable increase in people needing tests for every sniffle and cough. So now there aren't even enough tests so people can't demonstrate whether or not they have coronavirus.
We need to hold the government accountable for the way they prioritised eating out over education and failed the children and young people and failed to ensure schools could properly reopen with the full-time education that they were promised.

A school has closed in our area G. Manc/Lancashire.
They only just started.

My year 13 DS has had one half week in college and two people have tested positive already. Home to self isolate. Really really crap. How they can all sit the same exams on a level playing field I do not know.
I have a year 11 too. Double crap.

And the government also failed to ensure years 10-13 will continue to receive a full education for their life-changing exams in a year or two. These exams give access to university and that affects their life chances forever.

My DD is at home today because of a slightly raised temp.
Trying to get a test is harder then getting a slot at Santa’s grotto on Christmas Eve.
Looks like we’ll end up isolating for this week if not next week too until we get the inevitable negative result.
The whole time her perfectly healthy sibling is being kept at home because we have to isolate as a household.
And yes, it’s first week back here too.

Depressing doesn’t touch the surface.

The government only really see school as childcare, which is why their entire approach has been based on primary school settings. E.g. one or two positive tests out of 30 pupils is actually a much higher proportion of affected pupils than one or two pupils out of 200-plus pupils in secondary and sixth form - so these older pupils in huge bubbles are disproportionately affected if just one or two positive cases are found. Not that I want anyone exposed to the virus, but the approach should be statistically uniform. Or else the older secondary school pupils will be at home more than at school until the virus goes away or they get a vaccine. Not a great preparation for GCSEs and A levels and the DfE can't exactly ask teachers for CAGs for pupils who have only been in school for a matter of days for years 10 and 12 or 9 months for years 11 and 13.

We have to find a way to allow kids and young adults to go about Their business as normal.
Indeed , which is why the whole world is working on a suitable vaccine being made available ASAP @millymollymoomoo

I'm with you. They can't justify sending 400 kids home every time one has a sniffle.
September is always bad for colds as they go back to school and this year will be worse because immune systems need challenging and kids have been pretty isolated for the last 6 months.

They have to sort testing out pretty damn quick

I don't agree I'm afraid. If the alternative to keeping potentially contagious kids at home is for those in vulnerable groups to isolate, that would be a least worst scenario for me.
Has it not occurred to you that the vulnerable include school children and their parents?

Sorry OP, situation sucks.
I would happily have the Swedish model instead but few people agree with that (unless they're total nutters who like many other things I could never agree with).
DS is in bubble of 28-30, btw. His secondary school figured out a way, for yr7-8 anyway.

Are these children actually contagious?
Has anybody actually checked?
Are they catching it from each other or from elsewhere?
Has anybody actually checked?
Are they passing it on or just recovering?
Has anybody actually checked?

I'd prefer high quality blended learning too. I think that schools using each board should get together and produce online lessons backed up with worksheets which can then be shared among schools. In Scotland we only have one exam board, so the government could work with a small number of very good teachers to produce online or televised lessons. This could have been done over the summer. Those lessons could be used for those self-isolating, and to help with maybe half time in school for all secondary school children.
Why every school has to deal with the situation on its own is beyond me.

How they can all sit the same exams on a level playing field I do not know.

They can't. I also have a year 11, and it's rubbish. It would have been so much better if the government had invested heavily in online learning from the outset. As things stand, it's just a bit of a postcode lottery, and as always, it's the kids from the most deprived backgrounds who will be hit the hardest.

They’re not sending year groups home for sniffles, ffs. They’d only send bubbles home for positive tests. Hardly an overreaction.

Has it not occurred to you that the vulnerable include school children and their parents?

And teachers! Learning support staff. School office staff. Lunchtime assistants etc.

Has it not occurred to you that the vulnerable include school children and their parents?

Err... and their teachers?

They’d only send bubbles home for positive tests.
But what if the person who tests positive is not actually contagious ?

This was predicted and debated months ago on here. We’re at the start of September what do you think it’ll be like early December?!

The answer was blended learning allowing more stringent precautions in school. When this was advocated on here it was shot down in flames.

Unfortunately the alternative is this. Incredibly disrupted education over the winter for the majority.