The logistical issue with closing primary schools...

[Jourdain11]

Just want to say at the start that, in saying this, I do not in any way mean to undermine teachers' and school staffs' right to work in a safe environment. But there is a big logistical issue with the closure of primary schools, assuming that childcare arrangements would also be knocked out.

In the spring, a huge number of people were either wfh or furloughed. That is no longer the case to the same extent. Since the rules/guidance now is to "work from home unless you cannot do your job at home", there are many, many more people who are expected to go into work, at least on a part-time schedule.

Which creates a huge issue in terms of primary-aged children doing remote learning from home. Either you end up with a pretty large number of "key worker" or "unable to learn from home" children going into school (which creates issues for staff in terms of providing in-school staffing and online provision simultaneously, and also slightly defeats the point of the entire exercise); or you have thousands of parents having to resign their jobs, take unpaid leave, beg for time off or whatever (which is clearly very far from ideal). Or you end up with parents simply saying, "I pay taxes for my children to be educated in school and it is their right to receive this education" and sending them in anyway.

Seems the only way around this would be either to have a "short, sharp" shutdown with a (for example) 2-week timelimit, which might be more manageable for both parents and school staff. Or to stay open and increase hygiene measures in PSs, or at least strive to make them equal across all schools.

Thoughts?

How would those parents who don’t want schools to close next month, feel about pupils/staff wearing masks in the classroom to reduce transmission?

Not ideal and not all teachers are keen on the idea either, but better than lots of people sick and better than schools closing.

@MessAllOver I for one don't think teachers should be working in unsafe conditions. If that means schools have to close because they cannot be made safe in any other way, then the next issue is how to solve parents' childcare problems

But has it been established that schools cannot be made safer? From May there were smaller groups attending and it allowed for much better social distancing and fewer contacts between groups (ideally all year groups should have been offered p/t in school teaching).

Surely your next point, if schools have to fully close, is not just about how to solve childcare but importantly how to educate best offsite without it becoming a postcode lottery of provision.

@Fedup21. I would feel fine about older children (6+) wearing masks so long as there was tolerance for those with phobias/SEN or anything that made it difficult for them to keep them on. Also, teachers would have to make a judgement about whether their pupils were mature enough to wear masks or whether they would swap/fiddle with them/chuck them on the floor to the extent that they would be worse than useless. This is perhaps more a primary school issue though mask compliance doesn't seem that high amongst the secondary students we see out and about.

For younger children, I'm not sure it would work. I've been gently encouraging my almost 3 yo to copy me and wear a mask (we bought him a few child sized ones earlier this month). Sometimes he likes it and will wear it for a few minutes. But then it comes off or is chewed or dumped on the ground. For that age group, moving classes and activities outside where there is less risk of infection might be the better option.

These are all sensible conversations to be having, although they should have been had in September.

If a police officer is running for long enough for a mask to impede breathing, presumably they are outside or in a large indoor space
Not remotely comparable to being in a small room that cannot be adequately ventilated with 32 teenagers for 5 hours a day, where masks are actually NOT PERMITTED.
I live near a police station. They are always wearing masks.
However as the guidance allows you to wear masks you should.

@GrumblyMumblyisnotJumbly. From a parent's perspective, I suspect it depends on the age of their children.

For my 3 yo - you can't separate childcare and education. Good quality childcare (reading, crafts, plenty of outdoor walks and exercise) is education for him. Poor childcare (because he's in front of the TV the whole day) means poor education and also poor diet, health and wellbeing for him. His nursery providing an online programme would be completely useless.

For most secondary students - the childcare is a non-issue so parents will be focused on the quality of the online education provided. There may be issues in some disadvantaged students accessing that education.

For primary school pupils - depending on age and maturity, their ability to access online education will depend on having sufficient devices at home but also childcare/supervision at home (so a SAHP is needed). A school could provide a fantastic programme for its students, but it will go to waste if parents are unable properly to supervise it.

So, for secondary, the main issue is education... for primary, especially the younger ones, it seems to me to be childcare.

and it's widely discouraged

Who is discouraging you from wearing masks in the police force? That is simply appalling as your guidance actually recommends it! I think you should ignore them, show them the guidance and then escalate it to your line manager/Union.

I fully support anyone in any workplace having mitigations in place to keep them safe.

People with primary school children find it hard to imagine how much secondary school aged children still need someone around.

It is not acceptable to leave a secondary school aged child at home for 8-10 hours a day (they don't all have older siblings) to sit on a laptop on their own. Older teenagers will then have 2-3-4 hours more homework on top of that, usually also done on a laptop in their room on their own. I think the government will have to work out how to turn these children into automatons first because all their humanity will be taken away.

Plus they are not necessarily safe at home all alone. They might get into trouble, trouble might find them. My parents used to leave us home a lot (though not for whole days and not endlessly) and we would have weirdos coming to the door, e.g. claiming to have lived there in the past and wanting to look around etc.

@notagoodyear. I apologise...I must admit I had hoped the secondary years would bring me more freedom from "Mummy" (screamed over and over again). I was imagining hopefully that they disappeared into their rooms and you only saw them at dinner, but I stand corrected .

Neither of us are police officers

The problem with secondaries going fully online is that the government's childcare bubbles are for up to age 13, which suggests to me that they consider Y7 and Y8 pupils to need childcare. I have one Y7 aged 11 and one Y8 aged 13. In both cases I would happily leave them for a couple of hours or even half a day but I would baulk at a full day for the Y7 and even for the Y8 if it was several days in a row. I teach at a university so if universities close I will teach from home but I have a couple of very long days if they don't where I'd be reluctant to leave them. I'm a single parent so no shared childcare here. And other parents will be less able to work from home.

Mess not aimed at anyone in particular.
I have been there and could not have imagined that a secondary school aged child could need a parent around as much as a primary school aged child. They need support, they can't be left unattended for hours on end like a pet. Actually most dog owners probably wouldn't leave their dog alone at home like people are suggesting we do for our teenagers.

It wouldn't be that difficult to arrange childcare.
We just need smaller bubbles.
I have suggested this many months ago - schools (primaries and KS3) go on rotas week in/week out.
During the week out those who can stay at home do their online/home working at home. Those who can't can go to their bubble "hub".
The hub can be in libraries, community centres, sports centres, set up festival style in parks and car parks etc. They would be supervised by peripatetic teachers/TAs, holiday childcare staff, sports coaches, etc. They would be enabled to do their remote learning plus would have whatever enrichment activities their particular venue can support.
So if in a park - forest and circus skills, nature biology, sports etc. If in a hall or office they could do art, some PE.
It could actually be better than "normal" school!

@notagoodyear couldn't agree more. It annoys me the way everyone seems to think it's ok to leave secondary age dd for hours on their own.

@GleamingBaubles who will staff all this when so many teaching staff are of sick or isolating?

I've already said - peripatetic staff, TAs, sports coaches, music teachers, holiday club staff, theatre drama private teachers etc.

@GleamingBaubles

I've already said - peripatetic staff, TAs, sports coaches, music teachers, holiday club staff, theatre drama private teachers etc.

The problem with this is that these travelling teachers would then be potential disease vectors and/or at higher risk.

The other problem with rotas is that it requires re-designing the syllabus. If it was aimed for before Sept, then there would have been time to do so properly (almost).
Now, it's going to be scrambling and way more work at a stupid pace to do so.

Still, I agree with rotas

[quote MessAllOver]@BustopherPonsonbyJones. I agree. Both teachers and parents continue to have trouble adapting to the idea that the government/society doesn't care about them on an individual level.

For teachers - stop malingering and get back to work. No PPE/unsafe schools? Shut up, do your jobs and stop moaning!

For parents - bloody well look after your own kids for a change, rather than expecting "childcare" (even if you pay for it). Oh, you can't work as well? Talk to your employer. Employers just have to be "tolerant". Oh, they're not tolerant? Lose your job, default on your mortgage/rent and watch your kids go without. And it's your fault because they're your kids and responsibility, you know.

From reading this thread, you get the idea that neither group (teachers/parents) cares much about the problems facing the other group either - each is demanding sympathy while belittling the problems faced by the other group. Although of course, they're not mutually exclusive.[/quote]
Excellent post. Completely agree. I am a teacher but also a parent of a primary aged child that last half term:

1. Had to self isolate twice so had a month off school and wasn’t even allowed out of the home to exercise in that time (so worse than a school closing)
2. Caught Covid (DD and me) because a parent in my child’s class sent in their child to school whilst that child was waiting for a test-so desperate was that parent for their child to attend school - no ifs no buts, obviously...
3. I had to teach live online lessons into my classroom (secondary with a cover teacher) and simultaneously to pupils self isolating at home, whilst looking after my 5 year old DD (pretty much having to leave on her own and catch up with school work a teacher home) so I understand and have been experiencing the difficulties.
4. Have been working over Christmas to pre plan lessons for the first week back that can be done online that I only found out about on last day of school (thanks govt!) to try an make this transition as easy as possible for my pupils and their families.

So absolutely understand where threads like this come from and who contributes to them and it should never be teachers vs parents (or other jobs).
It’s very worrying for parents of primary (and secondary) aged children to think about what might happen if their children were not in school but there are other options than a blanket closing of schools that the govt have not considered properly and it is the govt where the ire should be aimed at.

"They would be supervised by peripatetic teachers/TAs, holiday childcare staff, sports coaches, etc."

TAs usually work with and are funded for individual children. When those children are in school they would need that person with them. Some of the children who need to be in school couldn't be placed in a hall elsewhere. They need the familiarity and facilities of school.

The idea it's about teachers being safe is false, though. Or, at least, it's not just about that.

It's very clear from the data that school aged children had a huge upsurge in cases after lockdown 2- essentially negating everything that lockdown did achieve.

Children obviously don't live in a bubble and infect others. It's 40-60yos (so their parents age group in many cases) who are being admitted to hospital at the moment. A large reservoir of cases in school means the elderly and vulnerable are more at risk.

It's not really teachers being safe vs education - it's everyone's safety being improved vs having schools open as normal.

If a rota system (for example) would reduce transmission between children, then that's the decision that needs to be made - it's not really about teacher safety.

@Jourdain11
I think if you search for threads by posters such as noblegiraffe you will see that teachers were making those recommendations in August. Parents and teachers (and the many who are parents AND teachers) would be a very powerful force if we worked together to lobby MPs and the media. We still need a plan for January though.

Ultimately, they do not want the images of people lying dead on hospital trollies. They don’t want the images of paediatrics overflowing with sick children. It’s all about what looks good and what is important for the greatest majority.

Lockdown 2 did nothing, schools carried on as a breeding ground and here we are. It’s not just secondary, who are still children too. The uptick in primary school children, the graph lines are running at virtually a 90 degree angle and the line is pretty vertical.

That can’t go on. There is an increase too in the parental age groups you’d expect for school children. Then they get ill, infect people, so on and so forth.

It’s shit but it is what it is. It isn’t a simple case of allowing children to go on as normal and shield everyone else. It doesn’t work like that and what is most telling is the attitude changes. I read a broad spectrum of news outlets and what is very clear, especially in Tory heartlands. The cat is out of the bag, everyone knows it is schools but a huge majority of people don’t seem to be willing to pay the price of schools open at all costs anymore.

There will be people working out how far we are from people dying on trollies, to how much we are losing constantly closing business vs working parents having to juggle. The price of schools open at all costs vs other costs including bad publicity.

It isn’t about what is good for the individual, if it was this situation would never have been allowed to happen. It’s about the ‘greater good’ which would point to a change coming. They do not have the support anymore for schools at all costs.

A great deal of the calculations being made about school closures are not working parents vs community transmission. It’s also about the value of education and the government’s recognition that it has limited tools to ameliorate that damage, vs economic harms it can write a cheque for. (Big oversimplification, but in short, if a business loses 3 months of income the government can give it that money. If a child loses 3 months of education, then it can’t write a cheque for that.)

But, none of this is immediately relevant to the subject of the thread, which was about the logistical issues faced by working parents if primary (& childcare) close. It would be very good to get to talk about that, given the massive impact it has on many of us.

No I don’t want hospitality businesses to go bust, no I don’t want teachers to get ill, no I don’t want increased community transmission, but if the government decides this is the way forward then I would like there to be some national conversation about what working parents are supposed to do here, beyond shut up about it.

Most children should not loose 3 months of education though?
Because they can still be taught on line, just as many were.

There are a variety of ways to continue to make sure dc get educated but some people only want to put obstacles in the way.

Hang on - unions pushing for a month of closure? Where have you seen that?!