I think a local approach of whack-a-mole COULD work. I was one of those people saying "Hold off until September, we'll have a working track and trace program by then." I think the limited return we did have in primaries and secondaries was fine. I think if cases are very low and tracing works as it should, then a return to full time schooling for everyone is possible, even without a vaccine.
But then I read the government guidelines, and they seem determined to just push everything open, up to and past its limit. I think if you are going to have schools open to all students whilst cases are low, then you have to be determined to close them quickly and decisively when you do get a case in them. And I don't think the government plan to do that. I understand that they intend to keep year groups open until there are two positive cases, to only isolate the very closest of contacts. Considering that you never find every case, due to asymptomatic spread, this just seems a recipe for disaster.
I think we should have a much better plan B and have prepared for a winter of switching back and forth for various year groups between home learning and school learning. I think if we have these damned bubbles and we insist on packing the kids in these bubbles together like sardines, then the bloody things should get isolated at a single case. If we're going to play whack-a-mole, let's whack the bloody thing quickly and fatally and ensure we keep cases low, low, low, like they are now.
Because once they start getting out of hand, Covid will do its thing: case, case, cluster, cluster, BOOM!