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.

@babybythesea

Dosandbabies - that your school will be fine is also anecdotal and can’t be extrapolated to even school. It doesn’t negate my point that not all schools are exclusively staffed by young, fit healthy people. Some schools may be fine, others will not.

Absolutely agreed. Both are anecdotal and specific.

I always though shielding was the best way forward in this. Of course there is no easy answer otherwise we wouldn't be in this mess. I am just increasingly starting to worry about my kids' education and mental health. And where possible I would like these issues to be a consideration.

I take great issue with your thread title OP, universally declaring yourself as standing up for all parents. I'm a parent and you're not standing for what I want at all. How dare you act as if you stand for everyone who isn't a teacher!

^This. There are some of us parents who are vulnerable ourselves. I'm struggling with long Covid and no way do I want to catch the new variant now. And my DH has asthma, so is also vulnerable.

We do want our DDs in school and will send them whenever they're open. Especially as they're adopted and need routine. But we only have to worry about catching it from our own DDs, not a whole class of thirty, or in a secondary school teacher's case several different classes every day.

@LemonTT so do please tell me what you think we should be doing - refusing to treat some patients? Letting people mingle? Shielding 40% of the population? All you've said is you're seconded to a hospital - what is your actual proposal?

And you can tell yourself I sound unhinged, but I'd love to know what you're basing that in? What have I said that isn't true?

Sorry, not @LemonTT, @Dogsandbabies

@DameFanny the capitalising your response? The ranting? Where do I begin. If the solution was easy we wouldn't be here. My view is that shielding was the single most important policy. I don't support mixing but I do think that the government was highly irresponsible opening pubs, shops, telling people they could mix for Christmas and then as a result have to close schools.

So I am entitled to feel angry that I go out and see groups of people out on walks, or know for a fact friends didn't cancel Christmas plans and the result is that my kids can't go to school.

At the point we are I think that teacher vaccination is of the utmost priority and all schools should be open.

@Dogsandbabies capitalising that part of my response that you seemed to be ignoring, and are still not addressing - in case you didn't notice it... And ranting? Really? Is that what you always say when people are giving you information you don't want to deal with?

So, absent a time machine, and with a population of diabetics, epileptics and over 70s many of whom don't want to be shielding - what is your proposal? So that your children can go to school?

@DameFanny you are clearly struggling to understand. I answered your question.

My view is that there are 500000 teachers, TAs and school staff in the uk. They could be vaccinated in a week and schools should remain open.

I can't engage with you further. I have a life.

This. I'm so sick and tired of children's needs trumping everyone else's. We are going to raise a nation of indulged little tyrants if we're not a bit more careful about the 'children are the centre of the universe' narrative.

What a crock of shit. You're clearly in the wrong job. You sound so bitter and twisted.

Far from raising indulged little tyrants (rather like you yourself sound), far better to teach children that during a crisis you can't just cower at home and certain things have to continue for the greater good.

After this pandemic we shall really see who are the true heroes and who the moaning, whining, obstructive of the country.

@Dogsandbabies Your proposal is to vaccinate the entirety of the UK school staff in a week, and not wait the 3 to 6 weeks for immunity to develop (or for the second dose) before plunging them back in the same crowded classrooms?

I really don't think it's my understanding that's in question you know

But do let me know how your plan goes down with your hospital colleagues.

Other jobs allow their employees to wear PPE; ensure safe distances and avoid crowded spaces that are also poorly ventilated

This is certainly not true in all areas of the NHS. On MH wards, patients frequently are too unwell to adhere to hygiene practices or wear masks. Due to their illness they may well require nursing within arms length for their own safety and that of others. Some often need personal care attending to by often three members of staff simultaneously, in confined bathrooms. Aggressive or agitated patients frequently need restraining which takes up to seven staff all round one person, frequently for a long time, each securing a different body part. LD nursing has similar issues.

I wish some posters would stop making the claim that teaching is the only profession where a person is exposed to 30 others for extended periods, with little ventilation and inadequate (or no) PPE. MH nurses have to wear the blue masks, which don't protect the wearer themselves. The windows don't open far for safety reasons. Obviously, MH nurses won't invoke Section 44 because it would leave no one to look after lots of vulnerable patients.

But when entire nursing teams and every patient on a ward has caught covid, at an adult rather than a child's viral load level, please stop claiming that only teachers are exposed in this way.

It's not a race to the bottom though, and all should have adequate PPE.

"Far from raising indulged little tyrants (rather like you yourself sound), far better to teach children that during a crisis you can't just cower at home and certain things have to continue for the greater good.

But that would be wrong because the rest of us do have to cower at home. Children are the only ones still allowed to carry on with life as normal.

There are other groups of key workers who are equally at risk of infection as teachers are. But this isn’t a criteria for priority which is defined by risk of serious illness.

Those teachers who are CEV are in a high priority group and will be called in weeks anyway.

We will invoke chaos if the teachers are escalated up the list and other groups like the police are not. But even if this is successful you can bet it will not be good enough for a small section of teachers who shout loudly about anything they perceived done to them. Which is everything.

Those teachers who are CEV are in a high priority group and will be called in weeks anyway.

The CEV group are, fortunately fairly low in most schools.

The CV group however are a much bigger group and currently not able to have even the most basic of protection from Covid when in school.

Personally if schools close due to teachers refusing to attend work, I'd place the lot of them onto £70 a week universal credit.

Why not furlough like many other employees were able to access if they weren't able to do their job?
If you sack then and put them on £70 a week are you happy for tax bills to go up across the board to fund it, for key workers and vulnerable children to have no supervision or support, and for there to be no one to teach your children post Covid?

If anyone else fails to attend work, they lose their job (which may well happen now for childcare reasons).

Teaching and school staff are subject to the same laws as everyone else.

Teachers have been on full pay throughout this crisis despite many by some accounts doing very little for 6 months

Teachers have been in full pay as they have worked full time, albeit for some - like many employees across the country - working from home.

'Some accounts' also show that most teaching staff have worked hard during the pandemic.

The CV group however are a much bigger group and currently not able to have even the most basic of protection from Covid when in school

This. Teachers are forced to work under conditions which are illegal in almost all other workplaces.

And teachers spend up to 6 hours a day in close contact, indoors, with large groups of people, with a lot of speaking going on. These are the PERFECT conditions for transmission of the virus.

And let's stop with the death stats - the things that are really taking their toll are "long COVID" and the necessity for intensive care hospital beds for those gravely ill, but not dying.

But that would be wrong because the rest of us do have to cower at home. Children are the only ones still allowed to carry on with life as normal.

This is simply not true. In fact it's an out and out lie.

There are so many professions that are having to carry on. My dh has worked as normal throughout in a critical role.

By the way school isn't normal for most children. There are measures in place. You may not be happy with them or think that they are adequate, but school isn't normal. My secondary school dc is in a room all day with the same dc and they now have to eat lunch in their classroom too. Masks in corridors when they go to the toilet, no going outside to play at lunchtime. It's not normal by any means.

Wider life is far from normal for children too, no seeing extended family, their hobbies are severely restricted .

So just stop lying.

Personally if schools close due to teachers refusing to attend work, I'd place the lot of them onto £70 a week universal credit

You forget that teachers are highly educated with masses of transferable skills. Many of us have left the profession in recent years and although anecdotal, I don’t know of ant ex teacher who has had problems gaining new employment.

My resignation is ready to go. I may or may not hand it in. Fortunately, I can afford a prolonged period of unemployment if it were to come to it. And I know I am not alone.

So by all means, sack the lot of us. By the time you decide you need us again, large numbers will have moved on. See how schools stay open then, eh?!

And let's stop with the death stats - the things that are really taking their toll are "long COVID" and the necessity for intensive care hospital beds for those gravely ill, but not dying.

I agree that for many people the issue isn't the death toll, horrible as that is.

But for many working aged people the lasting effects of having had Covid are far reaching.

I teach and caught Covid.
I was rushed to hospital due to a very real risk of heart attack or stroke as Covid led to me having a dangerously high blood pressure. Although cv I have never had issues with my blood pressure, which is monitored regularly due to my arthritis medication.
Whilst I was only in hospital for most part of three days, and only really had a moderate case, I didn't come through it unscathed.
I as off work for 7 weeks.
It's now over 12 weeks and I am still struggling daily following Covid. I am now taking new, full whack blood pressure mediation for life following my time with Covid, and despite this still have too high a readings every day.

Whilst it's impossible to say for certain where I caught Covid, my medical team believe the most likely source was school. My household were not Covid positive and have at no point shown symptom of Covid.

And let's stop with the death stats - the things that are really taking their toll are "long COVID" and the necessity for intensive care hospital beds for those gravely ill, but not dying.

^This definitely. And long Covid is something that really doesn't only affect hospital patients, a lot of people were never bad enough to go into hospital and just suffered at home. That was what I've been going through.

It was a relief to discover that long Covid was a thing, I didn't know what was going on for a long time when I just didn't recover.

Thankfully, I wasn't working before so we haven't lost any household income. But the pressure on my DH became too much and he ended up off work sick with stress. He's recovering now but it hit him very suddenly.

There are plenty of others who have had to be off work for months, people who were previously young and healthy.

“Cowering at home” is for the greater good at the moment, and those of us who can should do so.
Completely agree with prioritising teachers’ vaccinations. But that doesn’t help with children catching COVID at school and bringing it home to their families. Like it or not, the hospitals are in a desperate situation right now and we need to be realistic and accept that school closures are necessary.

@Whataloadofshit

This. I'm so sick and tired of children's needs trumping everyone else's. We are going to raise a nation of indulged little tyrants if we're not a bit more careful about the 'children are the centre of the universe' narrative.

What a crock of shit. You're clearly in the wrong job. You sound so bitter and twisted.

Far from raising indulged little tyrants (rather like you yourself sound), far better to teach children that during a crisis you can't just cower at home and certain things have to continue for the greater good.

After this pandemic we shall really see who are the true heroes and who the moaning, whining, obstructive of the country.

Nobody gives a shit about being your hero.

Kids needs don't trump everyone else's. It's just, if you are a mature adult with an ability to love. It comes naturally. It's hard but whoever said this seriously shouldn't work with kids. How bitter. I actually feel sorry for you being broken by the system.

@Watchingbehindmyhands

Personally if schools close due to teachers refusing to attend work, I'd place the lot of them onto £70 a week universal credit

You forget that teachers are highly educated with masses of transferable skills. Many of us have left the profession in recent years and although anecdotal, I don’t know of ant ex teacher who has had problems gaining new employment.

My resignation is ready to go. I may or may not hand it in. Fortunately, I can afford a prolonged period of unemployment if it were to come to it. And I know I am not alone.

So by all means, sack the lot of us. By the time you decide you need us again, large numbers will have moved on. See how schools stay open then, eh?!

So basically, if we won't pay you to do nothing now for the foreseeable future you will walk on mass?

Pretty shitty thing to do.

And also, after the mass unemployment caused by covid I think the 'secure' professions will be very attractive to people. applications to medicine, nursing and teaching are through the roof.

We need some new blood in, get rid of the dead wood who want to be paid to do nothing

Hooray to that flipping

So basically, if we won't pay you to do nothing now for the foreseeable future you will walk on mass

So furlough staff if you don't want them working from home or only being open for Key Worker/vulnerable children.

But if you in effect sack them - so they can then claim benefits - you can hardly expect them to come back running with open arms later when you've decided you do wnat them after all.