To ask if you will be sending your dc back to school after the holidays

[Toaskif1]

Yabu- I won’t
Yanbu- I will
As an aside what would convince those who aren’t to send them and does anyone know if schools will be issuing fines?

@Dontforgetyourbrolly

Yes I will . Those locally that are not are airing their grievances on social media " we are not allowed to see our families at xmas but kids can mix in school " so I feel it's more a tit for tat situation and they are not fully aware that children actually need an education and a school is a much more controlled environment. I will bet a months wages said families will be dragging their kids round The Range while they are off school and mixing indoors with friends and extended family.

Absolutely agree.

I have voted that I will be but think the schools will be shut anyway.. I hope not for my children's mental health and education (although I could send them in as we're key workers).
I'm not too worried, the secondary school where they are has only had 6 cases, even though we're in tier 3.
I don't think school will fine parents but unless you don't work and have teacher training how are you going to teach your children? How are you going to make sure their social skills are developing?
Covid is fucking terrifying but we've got to learn to live alongside it.
Like I said though, reckon BJ will close them in his speech today and put us in lockdown (despite promising in the summer he wouldn't so will probably call it tier 5 instead).

Keyworkers, so no choice. I would anyway though if they were open.

I would like to keep mine off and work from home for 3 weeks to see how cases go in school but I'm not sure if I'd get fined.
Our secondary are useless as replying to emails, quite often I get no response so even if I were to ask, I don't think I'd get an answer.
Our primary head is fantastic, the only time I've ever liked her strong personality, she encouraged us to keep our children off to self isolate so we didn't all get covid and pass it on to grandparents and then bring it back to school in Jan and confirmed there would be no fines or problems with attendance rates. I think she would actually fight to the end to make sure everything was done properly to prevent the risk. So I'm waiting on an email from that school hopefully saying we can choose to do remote learning again for a week or 2.
Not sure what to do about my child in pre school as it really worries me about him missing out on that... I would feel OK about starting him back 2 weeks later but not sure about any longer

Our school has got fed up of waiting for the government to decide what they are doing and have announced they will be opening as usual, and will be running the testing scheme from day one.

@Agoodbriskwalk

School staff in my household so no point in not sending them back as we are sitting ducks anyway.

All those sending your kids back - there will be Covid in your schools. They are not in the least 'Covid secure' and there has been no attempt by the government to make them so. The proposed testing is inadequte and ineffective (48% efficacy for that type of test). They're planning on testing rather than isolating now, so your kids will be sitting next to kids who've had close contact with Covid. Whether you catch it or not is just roulette.

Agreed.

Secondary school here, Upper sixth and year 10. Sixth former can't miss any more school. Destructive to mental health, and detrimental to education. She's already abandoned uni plans due to loss of confidence. I've just got my fingers crossed she gets lucky and isn't sent home to isolate. That's worse - when everyone else is in school and you're not.
Year 10er is later back anyway. But school is best place for her.

Tier 4 and my local area made it into the top 50 Covid hotspots list in the paper the other day. If schools are open, I'll send my two children in (secondary).

@Agoodbriskwalk

School staff in my household so no point in not sending them back as we are sitting ducks anyway.

All those sending your kids back - there will be Covid in your schools. They are not in the least 'Covid secure' and there has been no attempt by the government to make them so. The proposed testing is inadequte and ineffective (48% efficacy for that type of test). They're planning on testing rather than isolating now, so your kids will be sitting next to kids who've had close contact with Covid. Whether you catch it or not is just roulette.

You need to check the facts wrt efficacy of the tests.

Our school have pulled together a workable and robust testing strategy. However, they have confirmed that isolation of close contacts of positive cases will continue.

I haven't entirely decided yet, cases here are relatively low (100 per 100k) but that's a rise on previous and I think they'll continue to rise. DC1 is going to be at home for the first week anyway as he is year 7 but he won't take part in the testing scheme which complicates matters slightly.

To be fair to my DCs schools - four of them - they're all doing their best to be as safe as possible and have had no bubble closures since September but that's partly down to the area we live which has a low population density.

If schools do close then my DC will be able to go in as DH is a keyworker, two of them have an EHCP, and I'm a carer however I won't be sending them if that happens and will do home learning instead. They were eligible to attend last lockdown but I figured that keeping them home meant one less potential infection point for our household and freed up a space for someone who did need it.

We're in Scotland, so instead of going back as planned on the 5th, holidays have been extended to the 8th, 1 week of home learning, then everyone back on the 18th (hopefully, unless its extended), I'll be sending my kids as soon as allowed.
Here both parents need to be keyworkers to get a school place during this time, and its quite a strict criteria, to keep the numbers attending as low as possible.

Absolutely he is going back, for many reasons but each on their own reason enough for him to go:

• None of us are vulnerable
• DS is the only child at home and gets very lonely without social interaction with other children
• He needs an education which I cannot give effectively whilst working full time
• He is due to start speech and language therapy and assessment for dyspraxia next week and I don’t want to delay this
• He is in a class of 15 in a small independent school in a relatively low rate area with no cases reported so far
• I don’t see much changing in the short term so keeping him off for a few weeks would achieve nothing and I refuse to damage his education and both our mental health by keeping him at home indefinitely

Mine are going back. I've weighed up the risks and I think its important for my family to have a bit of normality. Going to school is the only place the children go, we have nothing else in our lives at the moment. If they aren't in school they are lonely, lazy, no structure, no motivation, homeschooling was a disaster for us last time as my son has sen and just couldn't accept that we had to do school work at home. There's no way I'm doing it again unless forced

Yes I will, because our school was useless at online learning.
And also my son was very ill during the last lockdown and I don’t want that to happen again.
Plus I am a keryworker this time (they recategorised my private care) so yeah they will be going back

Yes as they are year 10 and year 11. If they were younger I probably wouldn't.

I will. No one gets paid if we don't go to work in this house as we can't WFH.

Eldest will go in under the key worker scheme as she is secondary age, and at present there's no plans to shut primaries (I'm a TA). Plus I'm shit at home educating my own DC!

The school I work in has done it's best. It is not Covid secure, since CV is an airborne virus that can be asymptomatic that is impossible. But definitely we're doing the best we can.

We're in a tier 4 area and I'm in one if the groups that are more at risk if you catch the virus.

I'm thinking about keeping DD (Y3) off for the first week to see how things go. If the schools go back I suspect they may have to close soon enough anyway if cases keep rising.

@Agoodbriskwalk

School staff in my household so no point in not sending them back as we are sitting ducks anyway.

All those sending your kids back - there will be Covid in your schools. They are not in the least 'Covid secure' and there has been no attempt by the government to make them so. The proposed testing is inadequte and ineffective (48% efficacy for that type of test). They're planning on testing rather than isolating now, so your kids will be sitting next to kids who've had close contact with Covid. Whether you catch it or not is just roulette.

This a hundred times! Your schools aren't Covid free, they aren't doing anything better than any other schools. It just hasn't got to you yet

In the SE, large primary with DD in reception. School have bee brilliant in communicating, and whilst we are now in Tier 4, only two class bubbles have been sent home in the last term. Not sure about home learning as so far not needed to do it.

I am concerned though. I believe DD had it in March and was very poorly, we both probably had it about 16 days later but have no idea really -could have been hay fever or an asthma flare.

I’m so conflicted about school and would prefer it is closed for an additional week to account for Christmas mixing (which we were sadly unable to do).

We are also both key workers so I imagine would be eligible for childcare, we didn’t access this in the first lockdown as we could flexibly work, not sure this time.

I'm thinking about keeping DD (Y3) off for the first week to see how things go. If the schools go back I suspect they may have to close soon enough anyway if cases keep rising.

I was thinking of doing this too as DC1 is at home anyway so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to keep the others at home too and just tell school we are "self-isolating". It would give me a week or so to see how things pan out before making a decision and their schools have work online for children who are isolating so they would still have learning to do.

As long as schools are open, mine will be going.
School is proactive with infection control measures, staff and management are displaying strong, positive leadership. Cases have been minimal and my children are not clinically vulnerable.
They have suffered enough seeing their mum utterly burned out from working frontline with Covid patients and they need the social aspect of school, and they need an education.

100%. My kid’s school is very small and have had no cases.

‘Your schools aren't Covid free, they aren't doing anything better than any other schools. It just hasn't got to you yet’

Stop scare mongering.
There are huge variations between schools in terms of effective leadership and engaged, motivated staff who are implementing effective infection control measures. Ours has been amazing with minimal cases. The secondary school a mile away has had entire year groups sent home repeatedly.

I don't have kids, but work with them 1 to 1,so very often if something on their mind they will confide in me.
The number of children who seem to be pulling through and are secretly struggling but afraid to say so is shocking. The kids I work with are from families who are generally from supportive households. I can only imagine it will be worse for kids with negligent or abusive families.
Schools provide so much more than education and depriving them of that for longer than a couple of weeks is not acceptable. There should be provisions to home educate vulnerable children or those with vulnerable family members, but schools should be open to everyone who needs them.

Most people have no choice, OP. They need to work, and the children need to be somewhere. Nobody can magic up childcare outside of current arrangements.