Government removes statement schools are not considered "high risk settings" in guidance.

[IloveJKRowling]

Reported in the TES

www.tes.com/news/Covid-dfe-cuts-schools-arent-high-risk-line-guidance

From the article:
"The government has removed a paragraph from its Covid guidance stating that schools are not considered "high risk settings".

The Department for Education (DfE) previously stated in its guidance for schools that Public Health England (PHE) and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) advise that schools are not considered high risk work environments, and it is "therefore appropriate for teachers and other school staff to return to their workplace setting".

But following an update to the guidance today, this detail has vanished."

notevenat20 because we are in a worldwide pandemic of a novel coronavirus whose long term effects are not properly understood. These are not normal times.

Yes. The UK economy is being royally screwed with businesses going bankrupt left, right and centre. We have no hope of the economy recovering if we also fail to educate our children.

If we really want schools to stay open, why don't we - install screens around teachers' desks, like every shop/business I have been in has; make everyone wear masks unless eating/drinking, like every shop/business I have been in does.

Why can't we just do what they do in France? They have just the same fears and concerns as us and have a perfectly functioning system.

In primary schools it is just like in the UK except if a child gets ill with covid only they and the people they sat with at lunch get sent home.

In secondaries all children wear masks at all times and the same rules apply for who gets sent home.

That way schooling can continue with relatively little disruption for most children.

Masks are an impediment to communication and learning and I would be strongly against them being worn in class.

@Ecosse

Masks are an impediment to communication and learning and I would be strongly against them being worn in class.

The penny still hasn’t dropped with you has it? It’s not about you, what you want. You have zero influence on what we are hurtling towards.

We are not ‘hurling towards’ anything @Itisasecret. We will have a second wave and yes, unfortunately some people will die. Largely because we still do not have a working track and trace system and we have not learned the lessons from our failure to protect care homes in March.

What we cannot have is another lockdown that would destroy the economy and cause unprecedented amounts of poverty (and therefore deprivation-related health conditions and deaths).

@Ecosse

Masks are an impediment to communication and learning and I would be strongly against them being worn in class.

Evidence?

Also, the opinion of someone who doesn't actually have to spend any time in a classroom is not really worth much.

Pointing out death rates of teachers from the first wave when we were largely in lockdown is pointless. Many of the vulnerable and even shielded teachers who were staying completely at home then are now having to be full-time in school. There needs to be some sort of exemption for vulnerable staff, especially if the government are now admitting that schools are not a safe environment. I'm not one of them, so I have no vested interest other than concern for my colleagues. There should be the same exemptions from fines and online learning provided for vulnerable pupils.

I agree @MarjorytheTrashHeap, vulnerable staff and DC should not be in school.

In fact I would reintroduce shielding on a funded basis.

@Ecosse

Masks are an impediment to communication and learning and I would be strongly against them being worn in class.

They're going to come. Masks are pretty much the only bit of window dressing left. For what it's worth I doubt there's any point in wearing them after the first five minutes of a lesson given the numbers and ventilation in a typical school, but Boris has never let the science get in the way of a bit of populist bone-throwing. The question is, when even the masks don't work, will we finally admit that it's numbers, spacing and ventilation in schools that really matter?

Masks are an impediment to communication and learning and I would be strongly against them being worn in class.

Whilst not ideal, obviously, many countries are using masks in their classrooms and everyone is managing fine.

Obviously where there is an issue such as deafness, lip reading, etc we need to consider their use.

@Ecosse

I agree *@MarjorytheTrashHeap*, vulnerable staff and DC should not be in school.

In fact I would reintroduce shielding on a funded basis.

I am vulnerable but not in the extremely vulnerable/shielded category. The Government can't afford to fund everyone in the VC group - there are too many.

Obviously I have no way of knowing whether my 'vulnerable' status has contributed to me getting it or how my boy has reacted to it. But the bottom line is, I have caught it and I have felt pretty grim with it, including being admitted to hospital due to dangerously high blood pressure caused by Covid.

For most of the time in class, students are not speaking - or not speaking to the class/teacher. No reason for them not to have masks on. If all the students wore masks it would be a lot safer for the teacher to take theirs off during "talk" parts of the lesson.

@Ecosse

We are not ‘hurling towards’ anything *@Itisasecret*. We will have a second wave and yes, unfortunately some people will die. Largely because we still do not have a working track and trace system and we have not learned the lessons from our failure to protect care homes in March.

What we cannot have is another lockdown that would destroy the economy and cause unprecedented amounts of poverty (and therefore deprivation-related health conditions and deaths).

A second wave will destroy the economy anyway. Who’s going to go out to non essential shops and restaurants when there are 1000 people dying a day again and hospitals are overwhelmed? Not many people that’s for sure. The way we are going at the moment we are going to kill people and wreck the economy.

Surely the most sensible option would have been a series of planned, short circuit breakers to keep on top of numbers so track and trace can do its thing (hopefully this will be improved) which wouldn’t impact the economy too much, alongside a better plan put in for schools and universities where the majority of the spread is.

@Worriedmum999

As the scenes from Liverpool showed a few weeks ago, if pubs and shops are open, people will be in them.

It is highly unlikely there will be 1000 deaths a day- to be frank many of the people who would have died this winter anyway died in the spring. It is already looking like infections are levelling off in many areas.

I would however reintroduce shielding immediately you further reduce hospital admissions.

@notevenat20

Why must schools absolutely stay open full time? I mean, it would be great if they could, as a parent it's very nice to have them so gainfully occupied, it was at times very tiring doing homeschooling on top of everything else, they are in good schools which we chose very carefully and we have never ever taken them out of school for holidays etc as we prioritise education.

I see a lot of posts like this and I feel at core people are questioning the value of a publicly funded full time education system. I don't understand why we have forgotten the massive difference full time school makes to women's lives, to children's lives and to the success of the economy. How did this happen?

Ok so I wrote this.

I actually don't think there are a lot of other posts like this.

But I wrote it to challenge Ecosse who keeps posting this or that absolutely must or must not happen and we can't even discuss why schools should be staying open full time.

I was certainly NOT questioning the value of ....whatever you wrote....education.

But we need to discuss why we have to cram all the kids 30 or more at a time into tiny classrooms in a health emergency as the current situation isn't sustainable.

We need to ask questions and have a proper discussion thanks.

Full time school is really important- normally. But it might be that for many families right at the moment blended learning would be acceptable or other ways of doing things might work.

The US is doing blended learning and I think we should look at other models as well.

Haven't forgotten the importance of education thanks, but we need to look at the situation as a whole.

Also, in our family, my husband does just as much of the home ed as I do, probably more, there's no reason why it has to all be down to the mum.

Just look at the numbers in educational settings from PHE surveillance report just released today.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachmentdata/file/928766/WeeklyyFluanddCOVID-19reporttw43FINAL.pdf

I would urge anyone who supports closing schools to read this paper and explain why it’s ok to reduce disadvantaged DC’s life expectancy by taking their education away from them. journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2372732214549754

Is this loss of life acceptable because it’s not caused by COVID?

Why not do what they did in March, but instead of offering a place to certain groups, those that have no other option.

A single parent with no support network, so they can work.
Key worker with np partner to share parenting and no support network.
Very low income families with no space or equipment to work.

Or allowing parents to choose without having to face fines. It's almost like gov want the poor dead.
Because surely those who can afford to take their kids out would if they could.
It's really not a good environment for children atm.

“Because surely those who can afford to take their kids out would if they could.
It's really not a good environment for children atm.“

No. I’m a stay at home parent, I could keep them home and homeschool indefinitely if I wanted to with no impact at all on our family income. It wouldn’t be in their best interests to remove them from their small primary school, where there have been no class closures and where they are happy and thriving and learning. School is, while not quite as good as it usually is, still a fun and productive place. If they legally can be there they will be. If other people want to take their children out that’s up to them.

Blended learning @Ecosse not closing schools.

@monkeytennis97

Blended learning is tantamount to closing schools for half of each week as DC will be receiving no or very little education while they’re at home.

@Ecosse

I would urge anyone who supports closing schools to read this paper and explain why it’s ok to reduce disadvantaged DC’s life expectancy by taking their education away from them. journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2372732214549754

Is this loss of life acceptable because it’s not caused by COVID?

I've read it and cannot agree that taking children out of school during a global pandemic reduces their life expectancy.

It says that people who attain higher levels of education (in the US) have a longer life expectancy. It does not say that it is the higher level of education that causes the longer life expectancy, it says it doesn't know, and offers a few possible explanations including conscientious children who are more likely to complete further education are more likely to eat a good diet due to their personality type.

Given that we don't know that closing schools during this particular pandemic is going to reduce access to qualifications (indeed the most recent exam cohorts did better in terms of qualifications than they would have done had schools remained open), I think your suggestion that it is reducing disadvantaged kids' life expectancy is not supported by your link..

@noblegiraffe

If you don’t think education has any impact on DC’s life chances and life expectancy, what on earth is the point of spending tens of billions on schools and teachers?

We may as well do away with the lot of them and employ childcare staff on minimum wage.

I was pointing out that you were making a false conclusion from your link, Ecosse

Try not patronising a teacher by telling them education is important, eh?

Education is important, qualifications are important. But we can't say what the impact will be on the qualifications that these kids will get, after all the govt are making adjustments to ensure that lockdown doesn't impact overall results. We can't afford, as a country, to have whole cohorts failing maths and English, so they won't.

I don’t know about everyone else, however I don’t necessarily want schools to close. However because they are one of the most potentially high risk transmission settings there are, and because most of the research on transmission was with low covid community cases, and superspreaders seem to be a big part of how Covid takes hold - then we need to take school transmission way more seriously.

I want them to:

• be much better protected. Mask wearing needs to become normal over winter. Bubbles need to remain bubbles and not mix.
• contact tracing to reflect the current evidence now and the whole class needs to isolate if a positive case in class (this reflects strong current evidence that it is aerosol based and would basically ‘fill a room’ not just people sat close).
• Any parent for whatever reason able to keep their child at home to be educated - realistically there isn’t going to be a lot of teacher support so ideally parents would be able to provide a minimum of education for this period.