The exit plan and schools.

[NeverGuessWho]

I know this whole thread will be hearsay, but I’m just interested in hearing people’s opinions of where schools are likely to fit in to the exit plan?

A friend thinks they will be opened early on, as this will free up more people to work, and hence enable furloughed workers to return to work. This will crucially save money.

IMHO, schools will be one of the last restrictions to be lifted. Once schools are opened, there will effectively be multiple mass gatherings in every town and city, all at the same time. Surely this will result in a surge of cases of the virus.

Unless of course, they pursue the antibodies/certified passport route?

What do people think?

The whole teaching workforce will be paid off😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

Are you for real?? Who’s going to teach when the schools re-open? I’ve been working from home. There is loads to do for work.

No need for summer exams this year, that's a certainty. I do wonder about the autumn term resits though.

Presumably at some point we cannot afford to pay teachers so they might all have to be paid off

Xenia, who do you think is currently creating and setting daily school work for every child online, marking it, checking in with every child and their family etc?

Just sitting down (it's supposedly the holidays) to create work for the week back after Easter, contact families who are vulnerable, , and also start blocking out which objectives are currently not being covered (online teaching is less efficient for primary age than teaching in person) in the subject I co-ordinate so that every year group knows how to adapt their plans once we are back at school.

That's what we're all doing, except for the duty rota of staff who are running in-school childcare in what would normally be their holiday.

My DD, who is a sixth former, is currently on a 1:1 conversation lesson via Teams with a languages teacher - yes, it is holiday for both of them, but no, the teaching hasn't stopped.

Do you believe that every worker working from home in the lockdown isn't doing any work, so should be made redundant? If not, why do you think teachers aren't working, just because teaching and learning has moved online?

Xenia do you mean furloughed or literally laid off?

DH is a teacher and he has been working pretty much full time since the schools broke up. He's never worked this hard during a holiday before.

If we are locked down and have no tax revenues coming down for much longer we may just have to lay off all teachers with statutory redundancy pay but I doubt it will come to that.I would like us to reopen schools and work on 1 May.

I’m afraid Xenia is right - teachers who cannot teach online eg some sport, drama, lab tech etc could be furloughed.

Tax and vat payments to gov have fallen and will nose dive soon so there will be budget cuts to education. Pay freezes and cuts possibly to 80% or down to the 25k limit that other industries are seeing.

Pensions are down due to interest rates. It is is in everyone’s interests to get adults back to work as much as possible. There is no good solution here only a dangerous muddle through.

It would be really complicated to furlough teachers. Not least because of the recruitment again but teachers have worked most of their paid year any.

If it was a September opening we would only miss 13 weeks of work. However teachers are working and furloughing them would make it even worse for the vulnerable in society. I email my form group most days ad a welfare check.

Xenia, what fucking planet are you on? You can’t sack the entire bloody workforce in schools.

How the hell would schools open again in that situation. Get fucking real 😡

It won’t be the whole workforce - just some. Like in all sectors.

So Xenias plan is we dont educate our children going forwards!?

I normally respect Xenia's ideas ,even when I dont agree wih them. And they usually come from a place of research and intelligence - but her beef with teachers is just laughable in this one.

I feel sick at the thought of the schools opening early for let's face it, economic reasons. I don't think I would be happy to send mine back, at all.

It won’t be a extreme as some think - but I think entirely conceivable that lessons will be limited to core subjects and part time for many months and wages will reflect that sadly

We have to remember that whole industries have shut down eg hospitality. Senior managers on 50% salaries overnight. Junior staff furloughed and still waiting for payment. Sadly eduction is not immune to lack do money either.

Humina - lots will agree with you and if you can afford to keep them home - i doubt anyone will be chased for it and gov might be pleased to keep numbers low

I have a lot of respect for xenia but i suspect she doesnt understand teachers contracts which mean they've already done a lot of the work for the year. Even if the teachers werent on a rota for key staff and were doing nothing at all in terms of online learning, there are about 13 weeks of term left - so the savings wouldnt be massive once redundancy pay is taken off the bill. Plus the cost of trying to re recruit them all.

I didn't say I would to it. Instead I would reopen the schools on 1 May and would not have closed them nor the country in the first place. I prefer the Swedish option. We do not as a nation have the ability to pay everyone forever. Hard choices will need to be made just as across the work force 1m more people have applied for universal credit because they have lost everything including their jobs to ensure we keep the Covid deaths a bit more spread out.

Eg if were shut down for 12 months then I presume teachers accept the country could not afford their wage bill.

Xenia,

Would you also therefore accept that children aren't taught at all?

If teaching is limited to core subjects, then the knock on effect would be huge. The whole arts/Dt/drama/art/music/PE would cease to exist.

This would affect GCSE/A level, then a massive knock on effect at college/universites

Are the class of 20/21 just going to have 3 GCSE’s?

I'm a teacher. I'm actually working. So are thousands of other teachers.

Xenia, i think most people are assuming they will open in september - and 9 weeks (so summer holiday, easter and half term) are holiday time anyway

I suspect they may open in late may

I dont think many believe they wont open in September.

My dd is doing drama and music gcse. I want it all to be ok.

But if money and class time is limited what will go? By Xmas we won’t be able to pay for our existing education system.

@OhioOhioOhio me too.
I just cannot understand the mentality of anyone thinking we do nothing, we work all the time. Even if we're not in the class were setting and marking work. We're then planning work.
We THINK about it, stress and worry about our kids in our classes, the other staff in our schools, even the subjects we teach on social media are always there, it's there all the time. We do not switch off.
In my case for 2 key stages and 4 year groups. Covering set objectives. We read current research, we look at previous lessons we've taught, we reflect on what went well and didn't, then plan it all. We keep up to date with Tes, with the countless emails from Twinkl, classroom secrets, eTeach, new Safeguarding guidelines and don't forget the mandatory CPD hours we do as well.
We do not switch off.

I know so many parents who are attempting to work from home while looking after nursery-age or primary age children and their bosses are not being at all understanding. If offices re-open over the summer while there is no paid childcare this is going to be catastrophic for women in the workplace - annual and parental leave only goes so far. They'll just have to give up. I say women because statistically they are often the lower earner.

I also, like many, need to find a new job. I cannot do this until I know when nursery will reopen.

The trouble with the idea that schools being open are going to cause a massive spike in infections - which is at odds with the original SAGE modelling - and therefore must wait until September is that you’re only deferring that spike to a time where the NHS is under greater pressure.

I can see schools being part of a gradual lifting of measures in the early summer, with the school holidays being an ideal opportunity to tamp back down if it turns out schools are a much greater infection risk than SAGE modelled.

I can see schools being part of a gradual lifting of measures in the early summer, with the school holidays being an ideal opportunity to tamp back down if it turns out schools are a much greater infection risk than SAGE modelled.

Exactly this. I see schools as an essential part of the 'tap' that can be opened and closed and adjusted to allow more cases and then reduce the number of cases again.