So it’s going to be back to school for privately educated children whilst state kids get thrown under the bus

[S1nkorSw1m]

So no more primary children in and secondary left until Sep at the earliest.Of course this gov aren’t bothered about the nation’s children as they prioritise the hospitality sector over schools. Most of their children will be in private schools getting an education.

What an utter shambles.

None of the private schools in my town is opening to years 10 or 12 or beyond year 6.

I can see why the government is letting schools make up their own minds. They tried telling them what to do and just ended up with a big row and lots of local authorities, unions and school heads refusing to do what they were told. So it's probably going to fuel less confrontation to tell them to sort it out themselves. Plus there are differences between schools in terms of staff availability, amount of space, reliance on busses for the kids to get it, etc

Both dc are in private school yr2 & yr12.
Our school appears to be following the guidance so no info on yr 2 going back and yr12 they are saying maybe from 19th June after exams. But we only have 25 in yr12 so would be very easy to social distance.
Our online learning provision is far better than those of my friends dc in state school, we are doing full online timetables lessons, with all the bells and whistles.
From what I've gathered on here though, some state have the same/similar online provision as us and some private have the same/similar provision as my friends state schools, whilst I think the overall position will favor the private schools children that obviously won't always be the case.

Totally disgraceful. If we can open pubs and restaurants we should be able to open schools.

I work in a private school and only R, 1 and 6 are back, and not all of those either.
I don't know where you get the idea that all children at private school are going back. That certainly isn't the case at the school I am at. At the moment it looks like the rest won't be going back until September.

As a private school we also finish for summer much earlier as well than state schools, so they only have another 3 weeks left at the most before the summer holidays.

Why not temp mobile classrooms on the school field?

How many schools do you think there are In the U.K.? And how many temporary classrooms would each one need? There aren’t piles of units ready to go, they would need to be manufactured, transported, plumbed and wired in, and no doubt safety Inspected before they could be used. Never mind the issue of where they would find the extra teaching staff to man these thousands of extra classrooms.

DS2’s private school (and the other local private schools) aren’t going back until (hopefully) September. They are however doing full school days online.

Our experience of CAMHS is that they never do anything, virus or no virus.

Oops, posted twice due to rubbish WiFi

Near me (in London) state provision and private provision varies from one school to another and one borough to another. It isnt as simple as state versus private. Some state schools are providing a better service or equal to some private schools. Our private school are limiting what they offer to the year groups that have returned because the paying parents if other year groups will be most unhappy if it is too good and they think they are subsidising it. Our school have said they only have capacity to bring one additional year group back within the government restrictions. That will almost certainly be year 5 because of the school entrance exams that many will sit early in year 6.

I do feel the Government couldn't win on this though. As soon as they announced primary schools to go back, there was outcry over how schools could possibly maintain social distancing, children aren't guinea pigs for the virus, many parents insisting their child would stay at home.

Schools have, in my opinion, done an amazing job, splitting teachers and children across classrooms, individual tables for learning to reduce cross-contamination, creating small bubbles of children for playtime, staggered timings. But to work, it was only ever possible with 3 year groups.

So now they've confirmed other year groups don't have to go back, there's outcry again!

Private schools here have been teaching 6 hours a day online and Saturday mornings! The difference is vast

I think one of the reasons is the unions made it very difficult for the government to do it any other way. That had a huge list of demands, all of which had to be negotiated.

I’ve got one at private school. Only reception year 1 and year 6 are back. School is following government guidelines. No other children will return before September. Most private schools will not do anything different to govt guidelines.

To be fair, my year 5 is getting good learning and it’s Impressive what the teachers are doing but it doesn’t exactly make him enthusiastic about learning of make him produce any kind of work which is worth even looking at.

We should be less concerned about what is going on in private schools where the school has a financial incentive to ensure learning and more concerned about the disparity in the state sector

I’ve said before that my 2 older children are at a state secondary who are providing a full timetable of live and recorded lessons. I happened to listen in yesterday on a year 9 maths lesson. Bit of banter with the teacher before the lesson started, a register of pupils, out of 25 there were 22 on the lesson, 45 minutes of probability with teacher screen sharing and asking children questions which they were responding to politely and mostly correctly. I also had 2 emails from the school yesterday one about each child. One email telling me that said child was working well and engaging one telling me my 6th form child hadn’t responded to an email his form tutor had sent and to check up on him.

We should be far more concerned that the difference in state education is happening even more starkly than ever before.

*They

I get the sense that the government are getting to a point where they realise that equality of provision can't be maintained. By giving more discretion to schools, they will create more inequality between schools (within the state sector, not just between state and private). But perhaps they're thinking that they want as many children accessing education as possible, even if that's not fair. If they insist on 'fair', then they would presumably have to wait until all the shielded children could go back to school before sending anyone else back. Or they would have to keep all schools closed because some schools have a disproportionately high percentage of vulnerable staff and can't open. I'm not saying this is the right decision necessarily, it's just the sense I'm getting. And to those saying their private schools won't reopen now anyway - perhaps not, but this might affect the situation in September as well, and I'd be amazed if a lot of private schools didn't start offering summer catch up courses as well, if they're allowed to. My friend works in a prep, and I know her school is looking at this. I wonder if the flexibility will be extended to secondaries too?

I don't think there is this divide between private and public for physical attendance. The massive divide is to do with virtual, online live schooling. Hardly any schools plan to be back before September, at the earliest. Even then most seem to be planning for blended learning. All schools should plan for a confinement/virtual education, in case this happens again. A distinction is needed between Primary and Secondary, as the needs are pretty different.

I think children have been badly let down.

For most no education from mid March until September. For some home schooling of varying standards depending on whether parent (s) are out working/WFH, or have no work commitments, other children or caring commitments etc.

For a small number - online lessons or individual teaching from a parent that has the time and the ability to teach.

DS’s private school is open for the same Primary year groups as state schools but not all children in those years have gone back, in fact no parents in one year group wanted their children to go back. I assume if schools are now given the option to open to more year groups they might extend their offering but they break up on 1st July so there won’t be that much advantage.

The senior school isn’t currently open and we are waiting for a final decision whether they will open for a couple of weeks for Y10 and Y12.

I think some assumptions are being made incorrectly about private schools in terms of smaller class sizes.

Yes they have fewer students per class but classrooms are also built with this in mind.So a class of 15 students will be built to accommodate 15. It’s not a classroom built for 30 with 15 students in it. Therefore, social distancing will still be an issue even for them. To accommodate the 2 metre rule they will have to split into a group of about 7 (depending).They will have exactly the same logistical issues as any other school to sort out.

Discussing this on R4 Today now. Starts around 8.13.

How many this thread would send their DC back to school if they were open?
I get the impression, from multiple other threads, that many parents don't want to send their DC back to school. I'm in the send them back camp FYI.
Agree schools need to open. Unions haven't exactly covered themselves in glory to help achieve that (quite the opposite).
My DSC's schools have operated like a complete shitshows during this lockdown. Their DM's efforts (or lack of) haven't exactly helped with their homeschooling either (they are at state schools). My pleas have fallen on deaf ears and it infuriates me.
All in all I think the schools who haven't ensured their home learning programs are up to scratch need to shoulder part of the blame. Some schools, from what I've been told about by friends (private and state) are doing a great job of setting good quality learning and providing good support.
Don't knock the private schools though, just because they offer a much better service than the state schools. Good for you if you can / do send your kids there.

I work for an MP (& married to him)
A lot of parents have contacted him about schools opening. About 90% of people are outraged that schools are ‘opening’ at all (they’ve all been open to keyworker kids obvs). Only 10% want them opened more.

Many many teachers are furious that schools are opening to more pupils.

I know quite a few MP families. All their kids are in state schools. All of them want more opening of schools to more year groups. The unions are resisting.
We’ve had a lot of emails effectively saying ‘kids shouldn’t go back to school till MPs go back to parliament (they have) or ‘my kids will only go back to school when your kids go back to school’ (they are- we’re counted as key workers)

Yes-write to your MP, but write to the unions too, and your school.
Many MPs want schools open more. Don’t presume they don’t.

My son's private school is following government guidelines.
He has a full timetable everyday of teams lessons and work is sent through.
I sacrifice a lot to send him to private school because I believe the smaller class sizes and the ability to push him academically benefits him greatly as he has ASD/ADHD and struggles in large groups of children.
I do what is best for MY child.

My friends dc at private school aren’t going back til September.
They’ve had a proper full taught timetable and even end of year exams, all done at home.
My state school dc have had hardly any contact from teachers but have had regular work for most subjects. Some have been very lacking.

This is all about the unions who disrupt for the sake of it to make it look like they are doing something and gain members. Schools with strong leadership or those with less unionised staff are more likely to go back. Not sure why peeps are bashing the gov - there is little advantage to the gov of schools being closed.