AIBU to stand up for children and parents...

[alwaysraining123]

... and say that closing schools is not an option. Some observations.

(1) millions of children will suffer poorer mental health, educational deficits and be at risk of physical harm.
(2) if schools close now the government will struggle to get them back open.
(3) the unions are playing a highly political game preying shamelessly on people’s fears.
(4) online learning is of no use for most of the primary school years. Parents basically need to be available all day to support children.
(5) more parents are going to find themselves unable to work causing more financial hardship. This won’t affect your middle class sahps or people who can work from home as much- there are people who actually have to go out of their house to earn a living.
(6) if you’re parent and you’re worried you can keep your child at home.
(7) educational transmission of the virus is low and infection control standards can be escalated where needed.

Whatever is done we need to place maintaining educational provision for children at the heart of it. We need to make it work...there’s no other option.

BungleandGeorge anyone can buy an FFP2/N95 mask. Have a Google, you’ll find many places where it’s available to buy.

If they wish to, I absolutely think teachers should wear PPE (as an active PTA member I would be happy to suggest PTA funds go towards this). I really don't understand the furore why not.

I understand it's not ideal in primary settings but my children (nursery age and older primary) have seen their parents wear masks for months without a fuss. I don't know about screens in primary, I imagine this wouldn't be workable. Maybe for older juniors.

It will be tough on teachers to wear them and teach as they wish to but it's not forever and if it keeps schools open and teachers safe, why on each not.

I would also be happy for my children to wear a mask although I question if these would be kept on properly. My nursery child wouldn't wear it but the older ones might, at least for short periods. I can imagine lots of trying on each other's masks!!

Young children in other countries seem to manage mask wearing. It’s probably the older ones (the ubiquitous Y9s) that might be more problematic with the behaviour round mask wearing

BJ is prepping us for a proper lockdown anyway, que the panic buyers, let's all just sack it all of, and die of inactivity

The only thing I dislike is the narrative that teachers are more at risk than any other essential workers, or factory workers

No-one has ever said this.

sorry but I specifically said I was not slagging off teachers. I know what an amazing job they do as I work in schools so I am not saying they don't do their job properly - not sure how you got that from what I said. All I'm saying is that yes of course it's a risk for them but other essential services are in the same boat. To say the police are wandering the streets doing nothing is ignorance as this is not the case.

I understand that but people are on here saying that teachers aren’t doing their jobs properly and there are many threads who have said the same but no one has said police weren’t doing their jobs properly on nye because people know the situation is completely different so why is it different for teachers?

Why is it that teachers are getting blamed for the school closures?
School staff had just as much say on this as parents.

Yes many have asked for safer working conditions as it is more COVID unsafe than other essential workers jobs but I don’t think that is a bad thing because what makes it safer for them makes it safer for the students too.

@BungleandGeorge

FFP2s from a reliable source
lloydspharmacy.com/collections/ffp2-face-masks

There are gazillions of them on Amazon. But obviously a bit more difficult to be sure they're genuine.

The only thing I dislike is the narrative that teachers are more at risk than any other essential workers, or factory workers

Asking for safer working conditions isn’t thinking someone’s job is more important than someone else’s.

In most other essential jobs things were put into place to make conditions safer but this wasn’t done in schools apart from opening a window - which will obviously result in schools closing. So I can’t see how people aren’t on the same page.

Yes the mask filters however what is not mentioned is that unless it’s fit tested and seals around your face it won’t protect you from covid. The public have been advised against buying that type.

I think people are misguided in what they ‘think’ are the best measures. I’m all for a proper assessment by experts in infection control.

'Why is it that teachers are getting blamed for the school closures?
School staff had just as much say on this as parents'

@toocold54 I think the unions are responsible for causing the negative feeling towards teachers to be honest.

It is the media representation of the unions that has been the main problem

I think the walk out will highlight unions role

Why is it that teachers are getting blamed for the school closures?
School staff had just as much say on this as parents.

If the school can't open because teachers are refusing to go in, then it is the teacher causing that closure. That's why teachers are being blamed. No one is blaming teachers for the closures ordered by the government.

Well in my opinion the measures that have been put in place in many workplaces are a bit pathetic and not worth the risk assessment they're written on. Control measures should be effective not just make people feel as though they're doing something.

Having said that there have been 10 long months for better plans to be made for schools, education, childcare and children's mental health.

That's why I said I don't believe the government or the unions have children's interests at heart.

I think the unions are responsible for causing the negative feeling towards teachers to be honest.

I don't. This attitude to teachers has been around for a long time, during periods when teaching unions and their policies were not really even on most of the general public's radar.

The attitude of the general public/parents towards teachers specifically over the pandemic is down to ignorance and a desire to have a target for blame. They can't shout at Boris directly, so they settle for sniping at teachers on social media.

When they are told that classroom teachers have no choice in whether schools are open, and do not get to decide their school's distance learning policy, they just stick their fingers in their ears and shout more loudly.

Let's be clear - being upset or angry about schools being open or closed is perfectly understandable. Blaming teachers for it is not.

I'm sure most teachers are considering the safety of children and families and as I said in my post I do agree to some extent with the argument to shut schools but unfortunately the press and the teaching unions put it across that it's all about the safety of staff

For the unions it is! Their job is to look after the interests of their members.

The unions have been campaigning for safer schools from the get go.

This was so that schools wouldn't be seeing chaotic 'bubble' closures or whole school closures as happened last term, and we wouldn't be in this situation now.

How is that not in children's interests, if you believe that children should be in school?

Hopefully later we will see what the unions have come up with, on legal grounds.

I reckon each school, each classroom needs looking at by disease hygiene specialists, then looking at community rates, hospital capacity, air flow, temps.

Even within a school, one room can be far easier to open windows and sd in, than the room next door.

I don’t understand why parents don’t want the schools to be safe

(1) millions of children will suffer poorer mental health, educational deficits and be at risk of physical harm.

Unfortunately many children are at risk mentally and physically regardless of whether schools are open or closed - and I'm afraid to inform you that the education system in this country has inequality built into it. If you are so concerned about these things I can only assume you have been pushing for greater funding for mental health services and domestic abuse services - and NOT voting for any party that cuts them - and campaigning for the abolition of private schools and a restructuring of an education system that middle-class parents game for their own benefit? And that you will continue to do so after the pandemic?

(2) if schools close now the government will struggle to get them back open.

The government will only struggle to reopen them if they continue to be unsafe. If the government doesn't fuck up the vaccine rollout any more than they already have, and prioritises teachers, and funds school safety, there will be no problem. No one WANTS schools shut.

(3) the unions are playing a highly political game preying shamelessly on people’s fears.

This is a meaningless sentence straight out of the Daily Mail Anti-Left Fearmongering playbook. The unions are standing up for their members, as they should. Do you not fundamentally understand that unions are a positive and necessary force in terms of workers' rights? Or do you think that unions are just aggravating irritants and workers should just shut up and accept a shit lot?

(4) online learning is of no use for most of the primary school years. Parents basically need to be available all day to support children.
(5) more parents are going to find themselves unable to work causing more financial hardship. This won’t affect your middle class sahps or people who can work from home as much- there are people who actually have to go out of their house to earn a living.

True. There should be more support for parents who find themselves stuck between a rock and a hard place now. The target of your ire should be the government, whose responsibility it is to enable people to abide by the restrictions necessary to combat a pandemic.

(7) educational transmission of the virus is low and infection control standards can be escalated where needed.

Well this last one is where your entire argument falls apart isn't it. Because it's just not remotely true, not backed up by numbers or evidence or what we can all see with our own eyes.

@alwaysraining123

... and say that closing schools is not an option. Some observations.

(1) millions of children will suffer poorer mental health, educational deficits and be at risk of physical harm.
(2) if schools close now the government will struggle to get them back open.
(3) the unions are playing a highly political game preying shamelessly on people’s fears.
(4) online learning is of no use for most of the primary school years. Parents basically need to be available all day to support children.
(5) more parents are going to find themselves unable to work causing more financial hardship. This won’t affect your middle class sahps or people who can work from home as much- there are people who actually have to go out of their house to earn a living.
(6) if you’re parent and you’re worried you can keep your child at home.
(7) educational transmission of the virus is low and infection control standards can be escalated where needed.

Whatever is done we need to place maintaining educational provision for children at the heart of it. We need to make it work...there’s no other option.

It's a pandemic. Why do you think there's a choice? Other than to have more people die, either due to covid, or because there's no capacity to treat because the hospitals are full of covid patients.

Are you quite sure you've thought this through?

I agree with Newyear and think the unions have been dreadful right back from May when they actively refused to engage with the government and told teachers not to teach kids. As someone who has gone into work in a hospital every single day that infuriated me. Having said that some schools ignore the unions and actually put their children first. Some schools don’t however. I personally know some teachers that worked their socks off earlier in the year and some that diddly squat.
I do think teachers should be able to wear ppe and many do?
And I hope teachers and support staff are high priority for vaccination too. I would 100% support that.

@BungleandGeorge

Yes the mask filters however what is not mentioned is that unless it’s fit tested and seals around your face it won’t protect you from covid. The public have been advised against buying that type.

They are an awful lot better than the cotton ones and blue ones. As well as filtering they fit very much more snugly. My daughter is a nurse on a Covid ward. She only gets to wear blue ones at work, despite having been fitted for the decent ones. But she wears commercial FFP2s when she's out shopping etc.

The public have been advised not to buy them because there are a lot of fakes out there. That's why I linked to a reliable source.

On the vaccine roll out priorities can we be clear that vaccinating school staff only protects the school staff from catching the virus seriously. It is not known if it reduces transmission to others.

The priority order for vaccination has been determined to reduce number of covid deaths and hospitalisations as quickly as possible. Previous studies have shown that as a vocational group teachers don't have high increased likelihood of catching covid seriously or higher mortality rates. However I don't know how recently this has been measured and may have changed during November/December.

I am now convinced that teachers should be prioritised to get the vaccine simply because it will make teachers feel safer and get schools open. It will do very little to reduce transmission rate though and it will mean that some of the elderly and vulnerable who were previously near the front of the vaccination queue will have to move further back which may result in some preventable deaths and hospitalisations.