To think that those people calling for the schools to shut should check their privilege

[berryfull]

It’s all very well and good to decide to keep your kids home or call for the schools to shut when you have enough space/have a garden/ have enough bedrooms/ have a home office/ can work from home/one parent doesn’t work/ you can work flexibly / your work can furlough you/ you have enough savings/ you have enough money/ you have WiFi / you have a device per child/ your children can read and write/ your children are independent/ your children are neurotypical/ your children don’t have disabilities/ you’re not scared of your partner/ you’re not scared of your children/ your mental health doesn’t make you a danger to your children/ yiu can cope with the stress/ your partner isn’t a danger to your children/ your health is good enough to allow you to look after your children/ your education level is sufficient for you to help educate your children you can feed your children throughout the day ..... etc etc

Stop presuming that all children will be safer at home. There are bigger and comparable dangers to the Covid that school keeps children safe from. And the vunerable ones are not being looked after.

Keep the schools open .... please!

How about those wanting them to stay open check their privilege regarding health. Not everyone is going to get just mild cold symptoms, some of their children may be safer at home than exposed to a classroom full of COVID day in day out.

Track and trace isn't switched on in schools. If it were then the two week isolation bubbles would be constant.

[quote Baws]@flaxensunshine
Firstly, it is not the job of schools to cure all evils in society. Secondly, I’m assuming that if kids are being starved or abused that there will be social services involvement. In that case these kids be classed as vulnerable and will be able to attend school as has been pointed out many times already on this thread![/quote]
And that is where you are sooo wrong. Assuming that there will be social services involvement.. there might not be if they are hiding and protecting the people they are inevitable only able to be loyal to.

Also as I pointed out before, these children will not want the stigma of being known as vulnerable abs will not have parents who ensure they attend school.

Maybe broaden your horizons and do some safeguarding training - no you are right it is not the schools duty to cure all evil in society.. IT IS ALL OF OUR DUTIES. That’s right that’s life now, we all have a duty of care to safeguard children.

Please never say
Check your privilege ..

@TaxTheRatFarms - I agree with everything you said.

Yabvu

I'm a lone parent of vulnerable dc. If I catch it they have no one. They go into care. They can't close them quick enough as far as I'm concerned.

No one in real life I know wants them open at this point.

Seriously?? The safety of a vulnerable child who might be being beaten and abused/starved and god knows what else is the same as a grown adult with a voice and means to stay safe?? I’m done this country is fucked.

Easy to say when you’re not that grown adult!

And how is it going to help vulnerable children if the NHS collapses anyway? My godson has asthma. Good luck getting him on a ventilator if things get much worse!

Where was the huge spike in Covid cases that happened when the schools reopened?

How did you miss it OP? That's part of the reason we shut down in November.
Also if there are vulnerable children not in school (yours?), WHY arent they? Our school has been very good about accepting any children who need to be in school.

Special school,s @ZippedyDooDa , vulnerable children don't just go to mainstream school,s ,my son's special school closed from march untill September ,every child in the school has an EHCP and every child is considered vulnerable due to their disabilities.but it still closed , disabled children were very much forgotten about in the last lockdown.

@flaxensunshine
I’ve been on enough safeguarding courses thanks I know exactly what the situation is thank you.
So we should all put our lives at risk just in case there might be a vulnerable kid who slipped through the net? Yeah that makes perfect sense! Yes we all have a duty of care to report or protect vulnerable children but I don’t remember it ever being mentioned in the training that we should put our lives at risk in the process! 🙄 I will repeat again, schools have provision in place for vulnerable kids, we are in the middle of a pandemic and schools need to be closed for the safety of the nation as a whole. Your argument is not valid!

@SkinnyMinnieee
Well said!
@ZippedyDooDa
Exactly my experience to. Even though cases are being massively underreported where I live, I’ve seen a growing awareness of this on social media. How can people be missing this?

And I will repeat again, the vunerable children aren’t all being looked after. They are falling through gaps.

I must admit to a hollow laugh to the poster up thread who told me to ring social services. Social services are not properly operating! Over the last year we’ve had three phone calls. Mainly apologising that they cannot help. They are working remotely from home with hugely increased caseloads. All the services they usually partner with are closed. We got offered one afternoons respite last year.

You clearly have absolutely no idea what you're talking about!???? I'm taking it you don't actually work in education because if you did, you'd actually have an ounce of sympathy/empathy for the people who work in them..... I'm a teacher and a mother of two boys, one of which has a LD. So yes, I can see both sides!

They 'aren't being looked after' because the toris have cut or closed nearly every single card provider that they can get their greedy fat hands on!!!

This pandemic has made abundantly clear that schools have been doing the job for social workers, speech thrapists, physical therapists themselves! !!

You can't get hold of the social workers? Well surprise surprise! !! Let's just blame the teachers for not doing the jobs of six different agencies.

This pandemic has made abundantly clear that schools have been doing the job for social workers, speech thrapists, physical therapists themselves!
True Teachers and emergency services are left picking up the pieces SS are unable to deal with.
The system requires a full over haul with financial backing let teachers teach.

@FrippEnos

FractionalGains

So you reply with an anecdote, pulling apart of language and something random about being allowed to respond.

Good to know that you have no real response.

No I responded directly to what you said (including quotes), seeking further info, whereas this response is pure snark and lacking in any substance whatsoever.

I think it’s a real shame people like you do not appreciate the efforts of our NHS workers, to the point you’ve chosen to have a go at me for a post where I literally only pointed out the risks they took in first lockdown without proper POE, in response to someone who minimised this risks they have taken at work.

Totally agree, As a single mum I have to work to keep a roof over our heads and I don't have the option to work from home or flexibly. We live in a tiny flat with no garden and my dd 8 has suspected ASD.

Where are the threads bashing social services etc for not doing their job during the pandemic, saying ‘think of the vulnerable children’. Why is this only aimed at teachers?

I have empathy for the innocent vulnerable children but what about parental responsibility and minimum standards of fit for purpose behaviour? Are parents not accountable or issues always the fault of someone else even though it is concerning your own children? What happened when today's parent was yesteryear's child? How did your parent cope and raise you?

Is this vulnerability entitlement exceptionalism privilege in addition to non medically vulnerable privilege?

If the reason for school closure is to stop the facilitation as another vector for Covid incubation and super spreading then why are the most vulnerable children "privilege" to return to such a Covid risk environment?

This is not a vulnerable(ist) message as essentially the root cause of the child vulnerability needs to be pragmatically addressed at source before it becomes more detrimental to the impacted children. Schools are for education not a social care, housing, catering resource nor parental substitute. If these children social issues are cured at source then all the better for the children born into such environments. Perhaps parental suitability is a contentious and taboo and judgement issue.

Conscious this post (although not weaponised or with any agenda) will be open to abuse and misunderstanding to fit into any choice misappropriation and other unintended purpose.
Online is not always a friendly place these days as super sensitive types see offence when non genuinely intended. I am not super privileged as otherwise I would have the resources to properly accommodate a large multi children household and all the additional resourcing requirements associated per child.

If anything only medical professionals and educators should be labelled as “privileged” in a respectful manner as without these critical pandemic heroes we (the parental community) will be even less “privileged”. What happens if more medical and teaching professionals are ill? Will the necessary by definition NHS otherwise cope?

Stay safe and take care and importantly care of your children as best as you can - it’s a medical war out there so these are not usual times for normal schooling and usual expectations as it’s time to step up as everyone is facing this community challenge together. We need a community civic duty united joined up approach where we look out and reach out to help each other not go out and about to continue unnecessary “inadvertent” super spreading.

Totally agree, OP. The first lockdown was horrendous. One of my children is severely autistic and has severe learning difficulties. the special school was closed and I was refused furlough so had to work. I am a lone parent. It was hell for everyone and by the end of it I was really ill from the stress.

But these threads go always the same way on MN. It's a good reflection of society and how it sees vulnerable/disabled children - as disposable.

Sadly children will die during the pandemic and not from covid. Many people seem totally unaware that for quite a lot of children school is there safe place. Some will assume that all vulnerable children will have a school place ...they won't. It's so sad.

Their not there...phone!

It is indeed.

@berryfull

All the vunerable children are not all in school.

Correct, many vulnerable children are never in school because of a lack of SEN provision.

There are simply no school places for them ever.

I have two of those children permanently at home. No one gives a shit about the children's mental health, whether we have adequate space etc.

This isn't just a covid issue for vulnerable children by any means.