AIBU to hope that school bubble isolation soon stop and to ask what you think is a viable alternative.

[Moelwynbach]

I'be been listening to radio 4 today and also read a Guardian article advising 1/4 million pupils missed school last week due the required 10 day isolation period.

The Minister for Education is calling for an end to the regulation stating that September is too long to wait. MPs have called for immediate change on 19th July.

My own thoughts are:

• School bubble shut downs disproportionately affect women as the main care giver. Affecting long term career options.
• Infection rates in poorer areas are higher, children in these areas are already at a disadvantage educationally.
• The time away from school is widening an already significant socio-economic divide. *Children from less well of families have less opportunities to access technology and internet.
• Parents cannot teach as well as a teacher. It is a skilled job.
• Many parents who have zero hours contracts will repeatedly have their child sent home and cannot earn money.
• Many parents like me cannot teach and work from home at the same time.....My kid just doesn't work that way he is 5.
• What happens after all the annual leave is used? I'm the main earner and can't afford to take unpaid leave.

To this end I agree that something needs to change it is not sustainable for children or carers. At some point we need to accept that this is part of lives. I'm not saying we need to all run out and carry on as normal but how we do sustain this unpredictably? What would be the best scenario for you? Mine would be for no requirement to self isolate unless you are the infected child.

I'm trying to form my thoughts and so many things whizzing through my head.

[quote Peppallama]@CasperGutman there is no reason to believe that any of my DC's year group would be seriously ill being nursed at home. Yes some children may be CV and these DC can be given the option to isolate away from classes where covid is spreading but you're painting a picture of entire swathes of children being on death's door sorry but that just isn't supported by the stats and we can't let anecdotes and fear guide children's education. Staff have all had the vaccine so they are not working with "no measures" in regards to covid. At somepoint we will have to get on with it![/quote]
It's certainly unusual for children to be hospitalised, but even so it seemed a bit off that you didn't address those parts of the post you were replying to at all. It's much less unusual for children to have a few very unpleasant days at home feeling sorry for themselves and needing to be well looked after.

@0None0
*To avoid the need to close secondary classes we need:
...

We also need high quality text books, and many many of them, to allocate children their own to work from.

Or failing that, a list of text books parents are required to buy, if not Pp.*

You were on the money with some of the other ideas - sorting out classroom ventilation would be wonderful (but VERY expensive).

Textbooks though? Hahahahahaha. In two years, I think I've used text books in my science lessons three times.

We do need to end bubbles and self isolation but we also need a plan in place to deal with it. Vaccination should lessen the illness, but you can still get Covid even if you are double vaccinated - see Andrew Marr. So letting it run riot isn’t an option either as schools could end up shutting due to lack of staff.

So my thoughts!
We need proper contact tracing - find the sources of the outbreak - local public health teams are used to doing this. Abandon test and trace and give the money into public health teams on the ground and pass the tracing down to them. Let them advise schools to what the next steps should be - whether that is surge testing in that school, advising vulnerable staff and children to stay at home or as an absolute last resort close.
More money to schools for cover, supply cover, extra staff to help lessen the impact. This could also include extra technology, textbooks or workbooks like the CPG ones so children can work at home.
Get rid of the attendance focus from Ofsted and therefore no pressure from schools to send children in if they are showing any symptoms (that list might need to expand for children.)
Put in financial support for those parents needing to stay at home with ill children whether that is the business claiming or parent claiming.

I don't know what the answer is but I'm the second double vaccinated adult at my school to test positive this week. I'm CEV and now very ill.

There are some very poorly teachers with COVID in our area too, and it has been noted that more children are poorly with it at the moment than earlier in the pandemic

@Shieldingending

Let’s face it, there is no chance of proper social distancing in schools – primary or secondary, because classes are so large this simply isn’t possible...

As a parent and a teacher this has to stop ! My children are fed up of being sent home, I’m fed up of them being sent home and am finding it really hard to do my job. At my own school the number of staff self isolating because of contact outside school is making it just impossible for us to provide the high-quality education that we want to to our children ... It’s time to live with covid, and I say this as a teacher who is clinically vulnerable!

👏👏👏. My son is on his second self isolation from his bubble at school bursting. I can't believe people think it's fine for "bubbles" to carry on. At what point will we be learning to live with it? Covid isn't going away.

There are some very poorly teachers with COVID in our area too, and it has been noted that more children are poorly with it at the moment than earlier in the pandemic
This is happening in the area I’m in as well. Rates in primary schools in particular here are way higher than they were when we were put in a local lockdown because our rates were so high. All the focus in the news is about secondary schools, children and staff in primaries and nurseries are being forgotten about.

I disagree with restrictions being removed. They’re doing it because people want it to be over, not because it’s actually safe.

At what point will we be learning to live with it?
The problem is, when people say “learning to live with it” - what they really mean is living normally with no restrictions and just letting Covid rip.

Or more accurately

Bull

@Farinaz

At what point will we be learning to live with it? The problem is, when people say “learning to live with it” - what they really mean is living normally with no restrictions and just letting Covid rip.

I don't think it's a case of 'letting COVID rip', but developing strategies to cope with it. Testing may be the way forward here, but as more variants occur the strategy is going to change and that inconsistency can be hard to deal with.

Our area has generally had a really low number of cases but they are rising at the moment and I've noticed some pupils self-isolating in out-of-school activities locally so I'm counting down the days until the end of term!

[quote Peppallama]@Awalkintime I'd rather have a constant stream of supply teachers but have my DD in a consistent setting with her friends than be pulled in and out and have to sit and try and do work while DH and I WFH.[/quote]
There is nothing ‘consistent’ about a stream of supply teachers, even if schools could allow supply staff in and out during a pandemic.

What your saying is you want someone, anyone, to babysit your child, however unsafe, so that you don’t have to.

That is nothing to do with education, so don’t pretend it is

Schools can’t afford a constant stream of supply teachers

[quote CasperGutman]@0None0
*To avoid the need to close secondary classes we need:
...

We also need high quality text books, and many many of them, to allocate children their own to work from.

Or failing that, a list of text books parents are required to buy, if not Pp.*

You were on the money with some of the other ideas - sorting out classroom ventilation would be wonderful (but VERY expensive).

Textbooks though? Hahahahahaha. In two years, I think I've used text books in my science lessons three times.[/quote]
Everybody uses textbooks or some substitute. You might use power points, or worksheets, or chalkandtalk instead, but fundamentally, we need a source information, illustrations and questions. The most efficient, long lasting and portable form of that is a text book. If you are using powerpoints, then you are simply using/making textbooks in another format.

The only reason schools stopped using them is because ofsted randomly took against them one day, for no rational reason. I never threw mine away, and kept hundreds, literally, which I gave out immediately prior to lockdown. theyhave been extensively used.

Strangely, many pupils saw them as a new, more advanced form of learning

All the people who tested positive at the local school (plus parents) all tested negative on their lateral flow tests!

I think any cold symptoms at all are PCR rested and if positive the entire year group/school are PCR surge tested once abs then a week later.

It is disgusting. Basically lets put our fingers in our ears and run round saying na na na covid has gone!
The US has banned LFTs stating they are so unreliable they are dangerous! They have also invested in ventilation systems in schools as have many European countries.
Parents of clinically vulnerable children will also face prosecution if they don't send them into the germ pit. The press is already upping the propaganda on school attendance.
I appreciate that all these isolations are difficult but they should at the very least install ventilation systems and allow parents the choice to switch to online if there are cases in their childs class.

DS's school uses textbooks still. However, they have now asked pupils to bring in laptops everyday from next term, due to the success of remote learning during lockdown and the technology they were accessing, so I assume textbooks may be used less going forward.

Offer kids a vaccine, certainly at secondary, primary maybe at a later date.

Test, test, test, as was said right at the beginning.

@0None0 no I don't need childcare. My school aged child is able to entertain herself. She can't teach herself though, no online support was offered through either lockdown. I am also not qualified to teach her age group. Even a different supply teacher every day would at least be someone qualified. Spending most of the year at home with no social interaction being 'taught' by distracted parents because one child in a lunch hall tested positive is ridiculous.

Untrue we have had 3 kids in hospital in the past 2 weeks from our school one is at risk of dying. All under 5s. We have also had 4 contacts from the school - in hospital, one of which will likely die today -who is 33. We have a member of staff who is fit competes in a certain sport) and is in a very bad way. She is double vaccinated*

Hmm, really?

The safest solution would be to keep the children in school at all times. Camp beds etc could be set up in the assembly hall or in corridors, basic provisions could be sent in by parents. It would be a kind of army barracks/prison-like system with the kids being released at the end of term. That way there'd be no need for mixing with the outside population.

I guess you couldn't isolate the staff in the same way but they could do a reverse distance-learning programme, where the staff teach remotely but the kids are forced to stay on site.

I'm sure it would work well as long as Lord of the Flies wasn't on the curriculum.

No alternative is needed. Teachers should all have had opportunities to get the vaccine by now and by september should all be fully double jabbed. Bubbles wont be needed, children are at extremely low risk regarding Covid. There should be provision for parents to choose to keep their child off if they are worried about it for some reason, without being hammered about attendance, but other than that there should be no need to retain the bubbles/require isolation.

Untrue we have had 3 kids in hospital in the past 2 weeks from our school one is at risk of dying. All under 5s. We have also had 4 contacts from the school - in hospital, one of which will likely die today -who is 33. We have a member of staff who is fit competes in a certain sport) and is in a very bad way. She is double vaccinated*

Hmm, really?

Yeah that sounds like bollocks to me too. I know a few doctors working on Covid wards and in paediatrics and all saying they are not seeing any severely affected young kids.

We need to accept a level of low severity & symptom free Covid is going to circulate long term, just as other diseases like RSV and adenoviruses and other coronaviruses do. Yes in some instances those viruses make a tiny number of people unusually ill, but you don't see me fighting to close schools every november because RSV landed my daughter on a ventilator in picu.

'I'm not saying we all need to run out and carry on as normal. '
But why not . That's what you are asking of myself, my colleagues and pupils. Schools are in a mess again due to pupils not wearing masks whilst other sectors still do. I'm dreading September. I wish age 12 and over were being offered vaccinations. I wish the government actually gave a shit about schools. Apart from open doors and windows ( that's fine but my main classroom doesn't have any windows due to being a courtyard that they put a roof on to create a classroom) plus the school providing sanitizer out of their budget what have the government actually put in place? Sod all.