What do you think? Are schools going to be closed?

[mamamia2020]

We've just returned to the UK to live, my youngest is due to start his new school on 5th January. Big change, new country, brand new town. We're in a Tier 3 area. I know that it's all speculation but what do you think? I've been gearing my son up for his new school now thinking about adding the caveat that it might be delayed. I do hope whatever the decision it isn't left until the last minute...

www.gazettelive.co.uk/news/teesside-news/crunch-meeting-held-whether-reopen-19525748?ref=BNTMedia&utm_medium=facebook&fbclid=IwAR0nIDo3bQOuMbpRfY9MiPun9272DuWDmthepLXabmNC8tnAgPsNPiuH7N4

@WanderingMilly I don’t see how it is feasible for them to be kept off school until we get on top of the new strain, it could take months or longer. They have missed so much already. There is another thread on here with parents talking about how much their children’s mental health is being damaged by this.

I would much rather have primary school children home for 2/3/4 weeks over January and to be able to take them out for exercise every day, rather than more periods of self isolation where they are trapped inside. We are in T4, they’ve been home SI as much as they’ve been in and keeping them inside 24/7 is much more horrible and much worse for their mental well-being than a planned closure would be.

If they are going to close primaries, they need to announce it tomorrow/Tuesday at the latest to give schools at least some time to prepare: to get computers to families who don't have them, to print out work for families who don't have Internet access (so a loaned computer won't help). To pull out the old key worker child list and start contacting them again/contacting all other parents to ask if they are now key workers and need a place and make staffing rotas. Time to change lesson plans for online lessons.

But given this government, they'll probably leave it until this time next week and expect primaries to be ready to go by 8:45am the following morning.

Tier 4 here and our school limped on until the end of term. Our area is currently around 500 per 1000 and I’ve just had a text from the school to say 5 staff have received positive test results in the last 24 hours... I think it’s looking unlikely that we’ll be going back here

Mine are much happier at home, even in exam year. School is an unsafe nightmare. We have all gone down with it this holiday and had a shitty Christmas. I hope they stay shut to protect others. So do my children. Their mental health suffers at school, because of how grim they have become now.

Nope

This government is TOO FUCKING STUPID to do the right thing in an escalating situation

Have we not learned?

If we are going to have to shut things for a certain amount of time, then the earlier we do so, the better. Yet every time, we have waited until cases were sky high before acting, causing many more deaths.

It's quite possibly true that some places have relatively low cases now, but they won't for long.

We could have kept cases lower longer with the lockdowns we have had, but every time, we waited and we waited.

Can we not just, for once, lock stuff down while it is low(er) without saying that it is unnecessary? Can't we just for once look into the future and say, you're right, it is going to get higher, let's act now rather than in two weeks when it's horrendous?

I've bodged up a really rubbish graph to show the benefits of the same action taken earlier rather than later. Total deaths is the area under the graph. It makes a huge difference to act when you see it's about to get really bad, rather than wait until it does.

It's about to get really bad. We need to act decisively NOW.

My guess is primary/nursery will stay open but secondaries+ will be overwhelmingly distance learning until at least Easter.

DSs school is planning to be back from the 5th, because they reckon they can do testing and that will make it ok. Will it hell. So hoping they are stopped from doing this

Depends on the figures next weekend I think ? If they are rising ( cases, admissions, deaths ) then I suspect there might more closures.

All schools should close. However unpopular the decision is

I think will.close. I'm a keyworker and will send both my y1 and y6 to school as both me and dh and key workers

I think they'll close and announcements will be last minute and haphazard as usual.

I'm torn. My one year 10 caught Covid at school as cases have been rife since september. He missed a whopping 40 days in school, with 10.weeks of self isolations. Imagine that? A healthy 14 year old confined for 10 weeks due to out of control cases? We couldn't even get our boiler fixed in Dec and were all Wfh freezing.

His year 10 brother at a different secondary has had three SI and a school closure too.

The cases are insane at their schools - 10% of one form with it simultaneously despite the Govt lies.

However, having two in y10 we can't afford to miss any more school and there is no time like younger years to catch up.

On the other hand, 10 weeks of SIs and back to back being sent home, surrounded by Covid, is no life for any of us! Rock and a hard place.

I think they should shut as it is spreading fast in schools and with the unknown (supposedly) of the the new strain, it would be silly to allow them all to mix again..but really, none of us know.
I would be putting plans in place for if schools shut so that it doesn't come unexpected.

Seems like the public don’t want schools to open now. Maybe the government will close them as they like to give the public what they want

They won't close the schools. They have been adamant that no matter what schools in England will remain open and will not close again - we are heading for an even bigger shit show after they gave Carte blanche over Christmas. They should be keeping them closed for a couple of weeks whilst the numbers/damage from Christmas is assessed but they won't. Our local hospital is already full and patients are being diverted elsewhere (we are tier 3 and our numbers are lower than some tier two areas).

I wish they would vaccinate staff a d senior pupils (if not all pupils) then it would be safer to keep schools open.

@AwkwardAsAllGetout

I think they need to close and we should have a proper lockdown for at least a few weeks, especially in light of the new strain. Ds’s primary was lucky to be Covid free until the very last week of term when it shot through one year group like wildfire. The one TA who is presumed to have been the person who brought it into school has led to at least 16 of the children that I know of testing positive. It’s infected our family of 6 too, and presumably a lot of the other children have also infected their families. Those numbers are just crazy, in our area cases have trebled in a week.

Poor TA. She probably caught it from an asymptomatic child in her class. I hope she is ok.

@Noellodee

Have we not learned?

If we are going to have to shut things for a certain amount of time, then the earlier we do so, the better. Yet every time, we have waited until cases were sky high before acting, causing many more deaths.

It's quite possibly true that some places have relatively low cases now, but they won't for long.

We could have kept cases lower longer with the lockdowns we have had, but every time, we waited and we waited.

Can we not just, for once, lock stuff down while it is low(er) without saying that it is unnecessary? Can't we just for once look into the future and say, you're right, it is going to get higher, let's act now rather than in two weeks when it's horrendous?

I've bodged up a really rubbish graph to show the benefits of the same action taken earlier rather than later. Total deaths is the area under the graph. It makes a huge difference to act when you see it's about to get really bad, rather than wait until it does.

It's about to get really bad. We need to act decisively NOW.

Totally agree with all of this.

Infuriatingly I don’t think the government have learned at all.

It’s all about trying to make popular decisions until it’s too late... then making the right (unpopular) decision at the last possible minute, causing distress and suffering... it’s all so fucking predictable

I literally can’t think of a worse person to lead the country at a time of crisis than BJ. He’s so vacuous and spineless, he would cause untold damage even in ‘normal’ times, let alone when thousands of people’s lives are at risk from a deadly virus

Oh and my kids struggled with the schools closed (primary and senior) and I was so happy when they got to go back but I think it is a huge mistake to reopen now.

Speaking as a teacher in London this scares the hell out of me...

Covid-19: London Ambulance Service receives as many 999 calls as first wave www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-55461390

How can they justify opening schools in tier 4 areas? They can't.

@EcoCustard

No idea and have mixed feelings. My two dc at primary school have been fortunate that they have had little disruption in their school. Small rural village school but tier 3, seems mad to close. However recent weeks I know more and more people close to us that have tested positive, two are primary teachers and one has been quite unwell. Since March I have known no one who has tested positive yet now it seems to be here. I suspect they will go back, but for how long I don’t know. I tried to order school dinners online for one of them for the term as I usually do but it won’t go past week one which I thought might be a sign

Poor teachers. They most likely caught it from close contact with an asymptomatic child at school. I hope they recover ok and are not left with long term COVID.

I hope they will close schools. I think surely they must, but as others have said it’ll all be very last minute. It will be utterly shit for working parents (including me and my husband) but what else can they do?

As PP said I would rather figure out the work situation and be able to take my kid to the park every day, than be stuck indoors isolating every 2-3 weeks when the bubble gets an outbreak.

Bring on OxVax (we hope)

@FoxinaScarf in all sincerity unless an individual can confirm they literally only go between school and home and back again there is zero way of suggesting they caught it at school versus anywhere else they have been. Teachers aren't magically only able to pick up the virus in school. Stop it.

It’s absolutely rife here, so I hope schools will be closed. I think they will be for most of January.