NEU calls for two week closure for secondaries and colleges following leap in infections

[noblegiraffe]

The NEU has called for a two week closure of secondary schools and colleges following a more than 9-fold increase in the infection rate in secondary school children in a month.

www.tes.com/news/coronavirus-teachers-demand-2-week-school-closures-after-cases-jump

The infection rate in Y7-11 was 0.5% last week, according to the ONS survey of random households, but this nearly doubled to 0.93% in the latest set of figures. This rise cannot be ignored or passed off as relating to university students as has happened so far.

In other, entirely unrelated news, 61% of teachers report that if a student doesn't wear a mask in a school where they are mandated in communal areas 'nothing happens'.

www.tes.com/news/coronavirus-61-staff-say-nothing-done-if-pupils-wont-wear-masks

And Teacher Tapp data from yesterday had 26% of teachers reporting that their schools were partially closed to students.

In the meantime, the testing positivity rate in 10-19 year olds is 17%, which means that this group is severely under-tested and lots of cases will be missed. The rate should be below 5%.

Yet the insistence continues that in any lockdown scenario, schools will remain open. Idiocy.

I am assuming he is just going to achieve grades 7-9 at GCSE and A*/A at Alevel. His students must have bespoke plans

Well no, because lots of hard working kids aren’t able to achieve that regardless of how well lessons are planned

Also...I can name about 20 teachers who did about 4 hours of work a week during lockdown, plus maybe 2 days in school on a rota during those 4 months.

@DreamingofBrie I agree

[quote BunsyGirl]@CallmeAngelina I am not judging everyone by my brother. I made that clear in my post but a previous poster insinuated that people were lying by saying that some schools did little or nothing during lockdown. You are absolutely right, he works in a “Requires Inprovement” school. There is nothing wrong with his teaching skills but his attitude stinks.[/quote]
Your brother is one person in one school. Still does not mean ‘the school’ provided no work.

More likely other teachers in his school picked up his slack so the children did not miss out.
I’m surprised he has not been put on competency. Was he following school policy? Have you asked him?
Someone in my department (a man funnily enough) did very little during lockdown (so I agree with you there) but I set work for every one of his classes and marked all work that was sent back and responded to all of the students’ queries. He has since been put on competency and it’s not looking good for him.
You do mention your brother on every school related thread though. It might be worth digging a bit deeper as to what his school provided.

@OverTheRainbow88

I am assuming he is just going to achieve grades 7-9 at GCSE and A*/A at Alevel. His students must have bespoke plans

Well no, because lots of hard working kids aren’t able to achieve that regardless of how well lessons are planned

Also...I can name about 20 teachers who did about 4 hours of work a week during lockdown, plus maybe 2 days in school on a rota during those 4 months.

There is absolutely no way you can know every single working minute of those teachers. Even if you live with them.

Must be a very weak SLT if they allow a HoD to do nothing but planning for six months.

Most unheard of ..

Honestly I think we need to move on from what happened before and do what is right now.

And hope all schools have a standard they should provide.

I’m just looking back at all my messages from him during lockdown including the photo he sent to me of him putting his feet up and telling me that’s where he was staying for the next five months

Is that it?! I put jokey messages like that on my feed but meant nothing

@BunsyGirl he would be on capability and out of the door at my school.

Honestly I am shocked if this is the case.

What type of school and what subject?

@ChloeDecker sadly no one appeared to pick to the slack at my DCs school. There were lots of posters who were describing fabulous support- I was quite envious.

@ChloeDecker

I don’t, but they aren’t pretending to have worked throughout.

@StaffAssociationRepresentative I have called him out many times. He doesn’t care. And I don’t think anyone gets grade 9’s in his school, the results are pretty poor, unsurprisingly.

@ChloeDecker no, he told me he was only doing lesson planning for the next year and “answering a few emails”.

@BunsyGirl

I’m just looking back at all my messages from him during lockdown including the photo he sent to me of him putting his feet up and telling me that’s where he was staying for the next five months. Call me a liar all you want, I don’t give a fuck. When it comes down to it, my kids will continue getting a great education because they have great teachers. I comment on here because I feel angry and sad about the children of family and friends who do not have the same experience.

Can you point out where anyone on here has called you a liar?

[quote BunsyGirl]@StaffAssociationRepresentative I have called him out many times. He doesn’t care. And I don’t think anyone gets grade 9’s in his school, the results are pretty poor, unsurprisingly.[/quote]
What department?

Not a month. 2 weeks of a no notice, unprecedented lockdown then 2 weeks of the Easter holidays. Not the same as no work set during the lockdown. It’s wrong to lump ‘I wasn’t happy with the work set’ with’ no work was set’. Equally, my own primary aged child did equivalent of about an hour of one to one school work per day only. Perfectly normal for home educated children.What extra work did you ask for, for your child?

I don't agree with any of this and you have made too many assumptions.

It was a month of term time with no work set, not as you describe.

One hour of education a day is very different from 20 minutes of revision a week which no teacher looks at. What DCs school did was shameful in my view. No effort to contact the children at all the entire period just can't be excused either.

In the end I found a good school online that provided daily work which I did with the children.

Lots of tutors are very busy at the moment - I know a few

I'm not sure why this thread has been derailed and is now about how lazy teachers are.

To be honest, the circuit breaker that Starmer is calling for is for everything BUT schools to close. Are all of those workers lazy bastards?

Anyhow, if schools DON'T close during a potential circuit breaker, the infection rate will continue to rise exponentially as it has done since September, which is a direct result of schools opening.

And the infection rate, currently being driven BY SCHOOLS, will affect EVERYONE, not just 'lazy' teachers.

Hth.

🤪

Yes we found a tutor in the end. £30 an hour - money well spent for us but way out of range for many people.

rubyandben

Just talking from personal experience of the COVID-19 Patient Research Group.

@Ecosse

If the NEU gets schools closed for 2 weeks, they will never reopen.

Schools must stay open for many reasons- people need to work and we cannot damage the life chances and life expectancy of our most vulnerable DC any further than they already have been.

This.

Look at NI. Mark my words, schools will not reopen there on 2 November.

I'm not sure why this thread has been derailed and is now about how lazy teachers are.

Oh I am.

"If the NEU gets schools closed for 2 weeks, they will never reopen."

Ffs, it's not DOWN to the NEU "getting" schools closed. They will close if and when the GOVERNMENT concedes that schools are driving infection rates skywards.
And I think you'll find that they did indeed open again before.

Why are these kids who are being sent home to isolate being ignored in this argument about keeping schools open

I agree they're not being considered (eg in the debate over exams continuing, which ignores the fact that disruption is ongoing) but is it really sensible to close schools to make it fair for everyone? I've been flamed for saying this before on here, but it's not a race to the bottom in education, but some in the sector seem to think it is:

"close schools because leaving them open isn't fair on those who have to self-isolate"

"we can't teach online because it's not fair for those who can't watch live lessons"

We need a well educated workforce and that means improving provision, not making it worse so everyone has the same poor standard.

And I think you'll find that they did indeed open again before

Well, for a few year groups (and for a restricted number of children with keyworker parents) and for a very limited time. Between March and September, my son had one 1 2 1 with his personal tutor. That was the extent of his face to face time.

Check out the infection rates amongst secondary school aged children: