What's going to happen with schools?

[NebularNerd]

I'm a secondary teacher and I've posted before about my concerns about going back to work. For context, my husband was previously shielding which adds to my fear of catching this thing & I have two young children.

So I'm back at work, no social distancing possible but at least we wear masks I'm the corridors. I'm in the North East so in local lockdown, so not allowed to see friends or family, but still in daily close contact with hundreds of people.

I'm fucking exhausted at the end of each day as we have to move classroom for every single lesson as the students stay in their bubbles. Behaviour is worse.

Daily cases in schools in the local vicinity.

Staff off self isolating, awaiting test results. Students off in droves too.

And we're only four weeks in.

Honestly, how long is this sustainable?

I am not blaming teachers for this, but at times it feels as though some teachers are willing for the schools to close.

With respect, that’s your concerns clouding your judgement - you need to blame someone for the horrible situation and you seem to be projecting the blame to teachers which is totally unfair. I am a teacher, I know a lot of teachers. None that I know wants schools closed but they want a safe environment to work in. The government have allowed the safe opening of schools to be totally messed up. Even if teachers wanted schools to close there is absolutely no way they could close them. They will only close when there aren’t enough staff left standing which I’ll be totally at the the door of the government.

• will, not I’ll

I was simply saying that from another perspective, my children are absolutely thriving back in school.

So are mine. So are the students I teach.

I am not blaming teachers for this, but at times it feels as though some teachers are willing for the schools to close.

Far far from it. Every day the schools are open is a bonus. I'm not looking forward to online learning again.

I don't know the answer. OP, but as a parent I just want to say a huge thank you. X

@JustAPassingFashion

I don't know the answer. OP, but as a parent I just want to say a huge thank you. X

Thank you

I just want to feel safe.

To put things into perspective, to hold a cake sale, there needs to be a deep risk assessment...

Who takes the change, who holds it, how? Gloves? Then touching cakes? How.. Where are they kept, ingredients, allergy risks etc etc ext.

That's for a cake sale.
And yet in the middle of pandemic we have again for perspective, people freaking out because granny has seen her next door neighbour who isn't officially in her bubble people freaking out because a fellow bus passenger didn't wear a mask.

My so called bubble is huge at work, I'm also linked in by staff area and other teachers cross teaching.
I may be with 25 students but through other staff I'm actually linked to many more in terms of exposure. No masks!

Each student of course has huge links and exposure themselves!
Then my own dc are one bubble around 70 ish or so students and staff, the other at secondary around 240 ish strong bubble!

Yet people are getting upset because one man in a supermarket didn't wear a mask or stood to close!

Each day myself and my family are linked into hundreds of other people, we are all linked and exposed.

I'd like masks given out before each lesson or fresh every two hours, hand gel, masks, hand gel. I'd like their coughs and sneezes contained. Id like to reduce transmission when I talk to them and they to me.

I'd like staff in our health and safety to walk around and make sure at least one window is open in every classroom, to stop teachers or students closing them.
I'd like the heating on.
I'd like especially secondary dd to be able to work from home at least 2 days a week via on line teaching.

Finally I'd like to know, why some schools have been so proactive about getting on line and some have wilted in the face of it without even trying!

• teaching via zoom or Google meet is the key.. You can be safe at home, dc are learning and your doing pretty much the same thing except from home! In your slippers, cat on lap and a cup of tea to hand.

Our school is now shut due to staff shortages.

Normal time table though, apparently, via google classroom. Will be interesting...

Good luck, pontypridd.

I just wanted to come back to the thread and thank the many teachers on here working so hard in such unprecedented times.

I must say I’m incredibly depressed reading this though. I knew my children and their primary school were one of the luckier ones but I hadn’t realised how much so. It also makes me fear for the future of state schools. Covid-19 is going to be with us for years now, the vaccine isn’t going to be a magic wand that transforms everything right back to normal. If things don’t change I feel heartbroken for children who were already fighting hard against poverty and inequality, and maybe DH and I will have to take a long look at our finances and see if we can afford to put them into private school for secondary education. Teachers with no support, blended learning, bubbles constantly collapsing for the foreseeable future.. these aren’t what I want for my children and if the teachers on here truly feel that’s what’s going to play out then how do we start agitating politically to urge this change?* And what is REALLY needed? If it’s money then how can it help in the short term? New schools (extra classrooms/ better social distancing etc) can’t be built overnight. New teachers can’t be trained overnight either. What’s the answer?
We’re never going to be NZ so that option is off the table. Which comparable country is showing a better educational model and how are they achieving it? (I’m guessing Germany?)

If the government have a money tree that’s gone up to a trillion why aren’t they spending on education? Why aren’t parents angrier and agitating politically to turn their gaze to this?

*especially as teachers unions as far as I’m aware have done little that’s actually constructive to address the problem facing both teachers and the children.

Just because the teachers are smiling at the schools gates does not mean they are okay. Another poster mentioned game face. This is 100% what is going on at my school with every teacher. They are dedicated. They are professional. They are smiling. But they are not okay.

Finally I'd like to know, why some schools have been so proactive about getting on line and some have wilted in the face of it without even trying!
Because not all schools have the same facilities or the same cohort, or the same challenges.

I'm absolutely fed up with people acting like it's just feckless schools who can't be bothered to get set up.

My school is currently preparing for when we get a positive case, because it is a question of when, not if. We're fortunate to have a very active PTA, around a class set of laptops/tablets that we can loan if needed, and our parent survey shows most students will be able to access an appropriate device of some form at home.

A previous school I worked at didn't have that.

It's not rocket science to work out that schools will have different contexts.

Whatever schools do, people will be ready to put the boot in. That's the sad reality of the situation. Rather than hold the government to account, people are far too ready to jump on the lazy teachers and useless schools train.

@YouSetTheTone
Schools vary so much but with extra funds my school could have cut class sizes from 30 to 20 using spaces other than classrooms in the school. This would has allowed more distancing between staff and pupils. But we would have needed extra money to employ extra teachers and put in the tech such as interactive whiteboards.

@Glitterynails do you think if every school made similar plans and applied for funds (and were given them) this would provide short and long term solutions?
If every motivated parent and teacher lobbied their MP would this do anything?! How come the government can piss money up a wall on Nightingale hospitals or the magic furlough money train (not saying those things weren’t warranted) but wallet firmly zipped for schools? Why aren’t people angrier about this? Where’s Marcus Rashford when we need him?! Well, more to the point where are YOU Kier Starmer and Boris Johnson?

I'm most certainly not blaming teachers and if that's how it's has come across it's not my intention.

But I do agree with the pp I don't believe that Covid is going away even with a vaccine. It seems to me that teachers working conditions have been shit already and Covid is the straw that's broke the camels back. Much like many sectors. But children need to be educated properly and schools closing isn't the answer because the problem isn't going away.

I don't blame teachers. I blame the government for poor planning, failed testing. I honestly believed by now that we'd have mass, quick turn around testing in schools. But instead we have the opposite.

I also blame the messaging over the Summer that everything was great and we could all do what we like. It's like Boris said, there's no such thing as personal risk, you may be happy to risk catching Covid, but if you end up in ICU you're risking all the doctors and nurses. If your child catches Covid, you're risking all the other children and teacher. So I blame people who think they can have it all and do it all right now.

But for years now it's been a race to the bottom of cuts, blaming the poor, blaming the public sector. Now we are in a mess.

@YouSetTheTone I can tell you why the government don’t want to put funding in to cut class sizes. I can tell you how much better it was for children in June with small class sizes. Do you really think our Tory government want the state sector getting a real taste for smaller class sizes? No they do not! What parent, teacher or child would want to return to the days of 30+ crammed into small classrooms when they’ve experienced how much better small class sizes are in terms of education, wellbeing etc?

especially as teachers unions as far as I’m aware have done little that’s actually constructive to address the problem facing both teachers and the children.

Low blow. The unions have tried and bene blocked at every turn.

Funding for PPE, funding for hand-wash stations, funding for playground covers so we can be outside, funding for cover staff, funding for webcams/ICT (staff currently using their own devices), funding for students devices/WiFi, funding for supervision staff for staggered breaks (so teachers get a break), funding for the extra cleaning now required.

Well I write to my MP all the time but he's worse than useless.

He's only interested in Brexit and blocking road safety measures.

Marcus Rashford is still fighting child poverty. Just wrote a scorching public letter to Gav. twitter.com/marcusrashford/status/1309869117697122306?s=21

But I'm so stressed. Sometimes, I feel a buzzy panicky feeling that everything is going to fall apart, starting with me. I am all smiles to the outside world though.

Yes, this. A massive tide of panic that starts to rise every time you think about how things are. Which you quickly squash down and rush off to do the next thing you have to get on with. But there all the time. And everyone else you work with is feeling it all the time too. But when students ask you “are we going to close again?” you give the trademark MN Tinkly Laugh and say “I’m sure you’d all love the lie-ins but we’re here and there’s no plans to close! Let’s just get on with today’s work!”

Teachers also have kids in schools. Teachers on here are also parents.

Agree, it's not teachers v. parents. I am already dreading my own DC's bubble bursting. Personally, moving to part-time schooling would be a nightmare. DH and I are both teachers. We would have no choice but to reduce our hours if our own DC could only be in school part-time, then who would teach our classes?

I'm primary so it's relatively easy for one class bubble to isolate but without extra funding we haven't been able to put much extra in place for home learning than we had before, which was a mix of uploaded and paper learning. Technology is the main constraint. Being a small primary, we have an extremely limited technology budget. We're in a deprived area and the pupils' access to technology at home is poor. Staff laptops are a joke - mine is 7 years old and doesn't have a working camera. I managed to make videos during the closure period before but only because I used my personal laptop. Only about 4 or 5 pupils ever watched them though. We have 15 new laptops in school but they are used for teaching computing to all the children in school so couldn't be sent home with pupils that don't have their own device.

There are some problems that could be solved with extra money - technology solutions, supply cover etc, but there isn't even the money to cover hand sanitiser so that's never going to happen. The whole strategy seems to be based on just telling schools to conjure up better remote learning out of thin air.

"tired from wearing PPE & walking to different classrooms"?

Oh do one. I'm so over this incessant misquoting and misrepresenting teachers. I want my school open, I want to teach. Working from home was horrible. But I am tired and finding things a challenge and had hoped that this was a forum where opinions and feelings could be respected. Not a place where sweeping generalisations portray teachers as doomsaying morons

As a teacher in the NE I
Understand the OPs post and pov completely.

What's made it harder recently is that we are mixing with hundreds of children and other adults (I am as it's Sen) but you can't technically meet a friend in the park or go for coffee with someone or see relatives due to local NE restrictions. Everyone is feeling the pressure from that.

It's added an extra layer of feeling disheartened.

Cases are spiralling out of control; measures will only counter the influx of students. I have no idea how they bubble under our rules. Bubbles are close ing left right and centre. We've had 3 since the start of term. A whole school closed last week.

Being able to chat to a fellow mum in the park was the only lifeline.

At the same time, I know very well how important school is for our pupils in particular; some groups are really unsettled post lockdown and need to be in school. Not to mention experiences of DV etc.

There's no clap for school staff. We've had bashing whilst still working and now we are in protected in full schools attempting to keep some sort of semblance of normality and learning going, zero PPE whilst risking our own health.

We've also had a local tragedy; a little girl was killed by a falling tree at school on Friday in Newcastle.

@manicinsomniac

Teachers working in very large, poorly Covid adapted secondaries may well be. Teachers with pre existing physical and mental health vulnerabilities may well be. Senior Leadership Team teachers may well be. But the average teacher is, in my experience, really doing okay right now!

I'm glad you're finding pandemic life easy but yourself has just listed all the teachers who will be struggling. Have some empathy for those people. They're human and they make up a large percentage of teachers. I have colleagues that have handed in their notice and I have SLT friends who are job hunting. they haven't had any time off since February and can't keep going.

NHS workers may have it worse but that doesn't mean that teaching is a sustainable career under these conditions. Retention was bad before the pandemic.

Schools will close when staff are SI due to family members SI as well as bubbles being closed and added impact of illnesses from other viruses besides Covid. It's already happened up here to a few schools.

What's concerning is that some staff may end up on long term sick (my biggest fear). This is obviously fucking awful for them but will also have implications for schools.