Parents of secondarily school DC, so you feel you're in a bubble of hundreds, and act accordingly?

[Chaotic45]

My DS is at a large secondary school. His bubble consists of his whole school year, almost 200 children. For anyone that this is news to I think it's fairly standard for some secondaries as they all study a mix of subjects in different streams so they share classes with many different children of the same year.

The school year bubbles are kept separate and I take my hat off to the school for managing this.

They do of course mix before and after school with questionable or impossible social distancing on busses, as siblings, in clubs etc.. But that's for a separate thread.

I'm not criticising the way schools are managing this, but I'm conscious that we are all part of this enormous bubble of 200 families and that feels risky. So I am not meeting with any of my older relatives, parents, or friends who are at increased risk except for outdoors at a large distance.

This is going to become more tricky as the days get colder. I work outside every day all day, but my parents are already struggling with the idea of meeting outdoors and they want to come inside. Technically they can as we are a family of 3, and they are divorced so would visit mostly separately, but I don't feel it's sensible as our risk hangs in the balance of whatever the 200 other families that we have bubbled with are doing!

Dad is already talking about Christmas as without us he would be totally alone, he lives alone, is increasingly frail and sees very few people. But bringing him into our home feels so risky, even if we keep a good distance.

How do other people who are part of a large school bubble feel about this,?

we worked out that we are in a bubble of nearly 1,000 people.

So, bubble = people that you mix with who ar enot socially distancing/wearing masks
dc1 - bubble 150 year group
dc 1's friend that he takes to school in car, different year group 150
dc2 150
dc3 150

because they are all also in our family bubble, one dc's bubble is mixed with next dcs bubble at home.

I work with kids, 12 of them, each from different class. each one in a bubble of 30 (or 60, but we'll assume 30) so that is 360 kids.
I mix with my dcs at home.

That is 960 people, who we have access to with no distancing/masks.

And that of course, does not take into account the families of each of those people, who they are mixing with at home, so on an average of 4 people per family, that is a bubble of 4,000 ish.

On this basis we are very strict about our own social distancing and masks etc when mixing with others, we are much more cautious with my parents for example.

dd year = 350 club = 15
Ds year = 120
Ds ks = 120
Sd year = 90
Ss year = 90

Two of those travel in a taxi with 4 children in other years of 120/350. All the kids have contact with their other parents and their family, on top of that one of them is a frontline worker.

It's a lot of people.

Pretty similar to you OP. My DD is in a bubble of 212, mixing with different class groups every hour and then socialising with her friendship group at every break/lunch. I assumed that if there was a positive case, the whole year group would need to isolate, but this has not been the case. We received a letter to say the "small number" of close contacts the person had been with would receive an isolation letter. I really don't understand how this works at all, as each class my DD would mix with 32 kids. I'm assuming they've only made those who sit next to the infected child stop off.

Anyway, for this reason we are mindful when visiting my parents and elderly grandparents. We regularly wash our hands. We be careful not to touch surfaces and my DD sits as far away from them if possible. I'd say the number of times we visit has massively reduced. Not ideal given that I fear my grandparents won't be around forever, but needs must. It's a scary time.

@steppemum crikey that's a huge bubble, and many must be in a similar position.

I'm glad I'm not alone in feeling that this means meeting older or vulnerable people is very risky.

We are all my dad has really, and technically we can 'bubble' with his as a single man. But meeting anywhere other than outside feels so risky, but at 75 he feels the cold!

Yes, I feel similarly - two secondary age DCs, so two large bubbles (about 150 each in our case), plus a school bus shared with kids from all the other year bubbles from their school, and another school for part of the route, and lots of kids who take their mask off as soon as they are past the driver. So I feel that the risk of them being infected and infectious before us knowing that there is a close contact case is very high. My Dad is recently widowed, lives alone, is very lonely without all his regular activities so needs company, but is mid-80s with a heart condition so high risk. I am planning to drive to see him on my own later this month, but he is 3 hours away and it's a long way to drive to sit in a chilly garden or go for a short walk. And he really feels the cold. It's miserable - but I do feel it's important for them to be back in school. Only chink of silver lining is that schools have a two week half term here, so towards the end of week 2 of that should be safer for a visit.

I'm sorry that others are in a similar position with struggling to maintain contact with elderly relatives.

I can't see a solution- I absolutely agree that it is important for children to be in school.

Maybe changing the structure of school holidays so all half terms were two weeks long would provide a helpful 'break point' .

I'm in Leicestershire, our schools start back 2 weeks before most others elsewhere, so this is the longest term of all and we have a one week half term.

Now I think about it- maybe a four day school week could help too. I realise the incubation period is longer than this but it could help.

It makes my family more responsible and less likely to break rules as we don't want to be the reason the year groups have to shut. Our local secondary schools are doing a great job, my DC love being back and everyone I know is trying their best to ensure their dc are respecting them.

@Marcellemouse I agree. Many people I know feel the same. But I know that statistically there will be families within the bubble who are not behaving in that way, and that worries me.

I'm really concerned about the amount of people my two are mixing with so we are living pretty closed off lives. No grandparents visits, no meeting others. We accept the school risk as my children need education but we aren't mixing other than that.

I live hundreds of miles from any elderly relatives and don't come into close contact with any vulnerable people to my knowledge. However, I do have 2 dc in secondary school in large year group bubbles, plus I teach in 3 different primary schools per week, so I am crossing lots of bubbles!

Yanbu at all. I am not seeing my parents face to face because it's too risky with dd being back at school (bubble of 160).

I'm also in the vulnerable category and worried about being exposed, but she needs to be in school so what can I do?

@AlexaShutUp it's even more tricky for you being personally vulnerable.

I don't think there is any easy answer. I'm alway drawn towards looking for one, but there just isn't .

My dad is really suffering and I have the capability to help as he would dearly love to come over more often. I can visits him too, but there's a limited amount I can do from his garden....But with a DC at secondary, it feels extremely risky.

Its not really a bubble is it?

The year groups are not seperate because they all have siblings that live together and therefore intermix year groups. There will be interyear friendships and interyear relationships

All the 'bubbles' still use the same toilets, buses etc. Calling it a bubble is just a platitude, Its just children not social distancing.

Also, in addition to secondary teachers having to cross the bubbles to teach different year groups, presumably schools are still using external supply teachers to cover absence (which must be pretty frequent with self-isolations due to track and trace as well as absence due to potential Covid symptoms). Those supply teachers may be working in multiple schools, which could potentially spread the virus from school to school. Add in peripatetic teachers like me and the bubble thing is really not looking very bubbly.

With your dad youve got to balance risk vs benefit. If he is really struggling on his own then his life might be a lot better with you in it despite the risk

@DishRanAwayWithTheSpoon and @lazylinguist, I agree that bubbles are mixing. Although in the case of my DS school they are not mixing within school. They have separate toilets, separate break areas, and use seperate classrooms and routes.

Teachers are supposed to be at the front of the class only and SD at all times.

Outside of school, on busses and at home is a different matter.

@DishRanAwayWithTheSpoon that's what I guess I'm grappling with. I don't want to be the cause of my dad catching coronavirus. He is 75, frail, diabetic, overweight, with a pacemaker.

Equally though, we are his main source of human contact and family. So it's an extremely tough call.

Yes, we're going through exactly the same loops and don't have an answer either.

My stepmother (has been in my life for 40+ years) is 82, and her memory is fraying slightly. She's much better when she sees people, and we've been seeing her in the garden over the summer, but now DD is back at school and the weather is turning, I don't think we can do that any more. But then what?

Sorry not to have any answers or suggestions but as you say, there just isn't one.

@artisanparsnips I'm sorry you're in the same boat.

I work outside all year round so have plenty of warm kit and will visit dad with me outside and him inside for as king as I can.

I've also bought an electric outdoor heater, if needs electricity but hopefully will help.

It's still really tricky.

This isn't the case in my sons school.

He's in a class of 30. The school have grouped them together somehow, it's their maths and English set apparently, they stay together all day.

They have to wear masks in corridors and dinner hall unless seated to eat, and they don't meet other groups in corridors.

Teachers stay in their zone and wear a mask if they need to move to help a child.

Very staggered start/finish times.

When I've said this before on here I just get ignored or made out to be wrong/stupid.

As a family we are very cautious of what we do outside of work/school.

Daughter just started year 7, in a whole year group bubble of 300, with no separation between all the years.... so they all come into contact and use the same classrooms as all other year groups. It's only a matter of time before this goes wrong.

Just thinking off the top of my head, but if there were an extended Xmas school holiday, so 2 weeks off before Xmas,then families could choose to isolate and see vulnerable relatives.

We effectively had a lockdown in advance of Easter, so similar would work.

But
-it is hard to predict what would be happening then

• it would seem very unfair on all those people who had Eid cancelled at the last minute
• it wouldn't work if there were any other sort of Christmas parties going on

The other thing is, Italy has tests available (at the airport for example,quoted on another thread) that have very quick turn around times. This is not 100% effective as you can have false negatives and false positives. If you test immediately after becoming infected, you might well not test positive.

However, if such tests were available privately to give reassurance to families that they weren't infectious ,that might be something to consider, possibly. (I'm not sure what the cost would be).

@IdratherbeatPorthcurno I believe you. I think the approach taken by your school is easier in primary than secondary- but still not impossible in secondary settings.

However, it must have taken a lot of jugging, change and compromise. The old way of being allowed for seperate ability groups across different subjects, different subject choices and a rotation of art / music type subjects. All this would need to change.

The old way was most likely best for education, but now schools maybe need to put covid before education when timetabling.

I don't envy them.

@Chaotic45

I'm sorry because I realised I didn't really answer your question. But I keep reading these almost horror stories on here of bubbles of hundreds of kids.

I was surprised that the school managed to pull this out the bag and yes it must mean compromising. I know for example they're not allowed to use the music rooms, I think they've saved them for those doing music as an option, and it's a great shame.

My son has said on the whole he's learning more and there's far less disruption in lessons.

I think I'd rather this way than bubbles of hundreds.