The government is encouraging covid spread in schools

[noblegiraffe]

Bear with me, because if they're not, you have to explain this:

1. Schools will stay fully open end of. Even when they're not.

1. No masks allowed in classrooms where teachers and pupils spend the most time. The expectation that they would be mandated in corridors is fudged at the last minute to lockdown areas only.

1. Pupils are not allowed to be tested for the symptoms that kids are most likely to get.

1. Teachers (who in secondary will teach all bubbles without masks) are not to self isolate if there is a case in a class they have taught.

1. Fudge any data that may show teachers getting ill at a higher rate than the general population and Chris Whitty lying about it

1. Fudge data that may show school pupils having a higher infection rate than the general population

1. Not permitting / trying / mass testing in schools where there have been cases in case they find out how bad the spread is.

1. Actually sending letter to parents to tell them to stop getting kids tested.

9 Fine parents who try and keep their kids off when in contact with a known positive case.

10. Launch a propaganda campaign to convince parents that schools are safe using data from schools in lockdown, which every news outlet dutifully publicises. Continuing that propaganda campaign by releasing a video of socially distanced school kids wearing masks in classrooms.

11. Hide Gavin Williamson in a cupboard so that no journalist can accidentally ask him how his aim to reopen schools safely is going.

12. Announce that one of the school safety measures will be children in bubbles which will burst when there are cases. Stop this midway through September and start sending home as few kids as possible. Remove the schools remit from PHE control and put DfE in charge to enforce this.

13. Produce a Tiered system of responses to infection levels (rotas, masks, closures) to reassure parents, and shut the unions up. Then never mention them again and in fact state that they are not to be used.

14. When Hull begs for rotas due to imminent collapse of system, send a letter to all local authorities re-iterating NO ROTAS

15. Have some strange control over the media so they don’t mention any issues, or if they do, it must be accompanied by a picture of a jumbo classroom containing max 5 kids.

16. Tell teachers to ignore the app when it tells them to isolate, or to turn off the app completely

17. No funding for schools to implement any covid safety measures

Any other explanations for this list?

One of my friends is adamant the schools/unis thing is herd immunity via backdoor. Reckons parents are likely to be younger, and this is a way to get people infected but largely keep it away from loder people if theres a lockdown also.

I don't think there is a plan as such. I think the government clearly know how unsafe schools actually are though, but would not want to face the reaction to closing them again, or admitting they are unsafe, or giving extra funding to try and help. So instead, the lies and manipulation. Shitty shitty way to run a country.

I’ve been trying to think how to communicate what the situation is on the ground in schools given that posters were shocked by the corridor photo.

Here’s the covid test. Teachers: please review how it has gone since September and calculate your covid score. 1 for a yes, 0 for a no. Total out of 20.

1. Been in a crowded corridor no mask

1. Been in a crowded corridor with (majority) masks

1. Had to send home a coughing/ill pupil from your class

1. Coughing/ill pupil not removed from your class

1. Had a pupil in your class test positive causing some/all students to isolate

1. Have at least one class where you cannot be >2m at all times

1. Had a

Ours has gone from sending home whole year bubbles to 'close contacts', even though logically, anyone in the classroo with an infected child/teacher is a close contact to me?! But no, its only those sat directly next to them and such.

13 here as well

Excellent idea, noble.
I think it should be a sticky at the top of all covid/schools threads.

I am in a primary in a tier 1 area, regarded as doing well, and my Covid score is 8.

@Danglingmod

That corridor photo is completely standard to what it looks like in all of the six secondary schools my dh and I have or do work in in the last decade. Including right now.

DSD says thats pretty standard at her school too. From memory, thats what our corridoors were like between classes also. But thats going back 18 years now!

I'm a 12.

9, 45%: I'm not a teacher or a 1:1 TA.

@noblegiraffe
My score is 15

Oh and in a Tier 3 area before this second lockdown started

I have spent the day marking exams. I have an equivalent Y9 (ages 13-14) I hug and last year and this years are shockingly worse than last year’s even tho we had a robust online provision in the summer term. I realise it will fall mostly on deaf ears here with the closure obsessives, but we really cannot afford any more school closures -kids will seriously suffer for zero upside.

Obviously not hugging

@Susanwouldntlikeit, who are the "closure obsessives" you mean?

11 for me, was in tier 2 area.

I scored 13 (I'm in school admin) - plus I will add myself an extra point for :
has face to face conversation with every single visitor to our school - even those called to collect poorly children who are going home to isolate
Cleans Medical room after every use by potential Covid patients + others
Deals with students and teachers and SLT across bubbles constantly
Works in windowless office, zero ventilation, not 2 metres apart, with a team of people who are almost exclusively taking either on the phone or with others or to each other.

Not surprising we have all now had Covid is it??

And @Susanwouldntlikeit, out of interest, what did you score on @noblegiraffe's test?

@noblegiraffe, I know it would muck up the % calculations, but ought there not to be a point for teaching 30+ pupils for an hour+ in a room with no opening windows?

Wow @thenewaveragebear1983 , does your school actually have a risk assessment?!

My score is 13. Secondary, average size.

@Susanwouldntlikeit - exactly why mitigation measures in school need to be far better than the pathetic guidance we are currently working under, school closures are in no ones interest but schools are closing because they are in no way safe. Not sure who you think the ‘closure obsessives’ are, plenty of ‘schools open safely obsessives’.

11 , tier 3 secondary

I am a 12 tier 3 area

14 T1 area.

My score is only 7 I consider myself very lucky. Teaching only 6 groups probably helps!