Feeling sick about sending one of my kids back to school

[Anniemabel]

I’ve got three, one in nursery and two in different schools. Two of the settings I trust and one I’ve completely lost confidence in. I’m really struggling with the thought of sending ds2 back to school tomorrow.

The school has been really light on the detail around what measures they have / are taking but they’ve said that classrooms won’t look any different.

All the communications with parents are fairly repetitive and seem to be mainly focusing on giving us a little bit of info on a need to know basis and telling us they are very busy and not to contact them unless extremely urgent. Generally, everything has a flavour of trying to keep parents at arms length. There are about 100 kids in the school and taking account of siblings etc probably about 60 sets of parents.

I kind of get that as a teacher / school, it must be time consuming fielding questions from 60 parents and they want to discourage too many questions. But surely the way to do that would be to preempt questions by setting out comprehensive info for parents. Part of me feels like they are not being transparent with us about the measures they’re taking because they are doing the bare minimum. When I ask sensible questions i feel like a nuisance.

It doesn’t help that some parents are not following govt guidance about social distancing at all (photos all over Facebook) and yet I will be fined if I don’t send my child into class with them everyday and the school won’t give me any info which helps me to weigh up that risk without me feeling like I’m being a nuisance. I’ve heard of other schools sending kids videos of what their classroom will look like and walking tours of the school and talking them through the changes. I don’t know how to resolve this.

Are you high risk/vulnerable? Because if not, I think you need to just try to relax & get over this anxiety. School classrooms won’t look much different. They are not socially distancing children in classrooms. They’ll be in a bubble of 30. I believe the desks all have to face forwards or at least, not facing each other.

I sent my DD back to nursery in June. Since then, I’ve simply accepted I’ve got a risk of catching it. But also, we are all low risk so I don’t much worry. My 3 year old doesn’t distance nursery (quite rightly) & is in a bubble of 21 a day but they all attend on different days so she is def potentially exposed to children who attend on all 5 days even though she only attends 3 days. They wash their hands more frequently, wash the toys etc etc but mostly, it’s quite normal. As school will be.

You’ve got kids in 3 different settings. You just need to accept your risk. And if you are low risk, get on with it!

I guess it’s a struggle to see on social media that kids in my child’s class have not been following govt guidance at all and then for him to be forced have “close contact” with them. I just feel like it’s all taken out of my control and I’m having information withheld. Schools are only safe if the guidance is followed in school and in society,

My dc school published their full risk assessment it was quite comprehensive and although its clear any measures they put in only reduce risk and not eradicate them im quite happy with the measures they have taken and how open they have been with parents. The HT has been contactable throughout the whole lockdown and summer holidays, she's sent out regular FAQs over the summer with some of the enquiries she's had. I think she's been bloody brilliant tbh and wouldn't have blamed her one bit if she had turned her phone off for a few weeks over the summer.
Don't feel like you are being a nuisance asking questions, they should have been more open with parents in the first place.
I've already had a dojo message from DS3 Y1 teacher this morning welcoming everyone back to school and to contact her this afternoon with any concerns or queries we might have before the children return tomorrow.

I think you make a good point @Uhoh2020 and this may be why I’m fine about my other two children going back - I feel like in their settings everything that could be done to mitigate risk will be done even though it’s impossible to be free from risk.

I think it’s the cagey nature of ds2’s school’s communications that is giving me cause for concern. I guess it’s just luck of the draw whether you get a good or a bad headteacher. It’s a huge responsibility at the moment as their actions (or inaction!) impacts on the whole community.

Technically they should all be making the same types of changes maybe some schools are just being more vocal about them than others.

@Anniemabel

I guess it’s a struggle to see on social media that kids in my child’s class have not been following govt guidance at all and then for him to be forced have “close contact” with them. I just feel like it’s all taken out of my control and I’m having information withheld. Schools are only safe if the guidance is followed in school and in society,

Take comfort in the fact that those that did not follow govt. guidance are healthy and attending school.

School isn't made 'safe' or 'unsafe' based on whether the attendees are following guidance - this is for the control of the virus on a local/national basis and nothing to do with your personal risk.

Both yourself and your child (and everyone else) have a risk of catching this virus, which if you are healthy and under 50 poses no more risk to you than any other virus - it only feels like it does because of what you've read in the media which was designed to make you comply with government guidance. Relax and carry on with your life.

@Tfoot75 yes it does. attendees who don’t follow govt guidance are more likely to catch and spread the virus. That’s the whole point in the guidance, to minimise the spread. If those people are at my child’s school he’ll be the one catching it.

I massively concerned about sending my child back because of the measures they have put in place. In order for masks to be effective and not just become horrific germ-rags, they need to be put on carefully and not screwed up in the bottom of bags/pockets etc. This is in reality NOT going to happen and yet the school are insisting on masks in corridors etc etc which means that they will be in and out of pockets several times a day. This is going to be far more risky than not wearing masks.

Most schools are having year group or class bubbles with no social distancing within that and with the numbers of pupils being 100 that is a very small school so the likelihood is that not that much is changing.

Your issue appears to be with other parents not following government guidance which actually the school cant solve

As a teacher my view is if you have doubts act on them. Your concerns are real and valid