Headteachers proposal

[DfEisashambles]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9179961/Headteachers-send-Boris-Johnson-plan-vaccinate-one-million-staff-half-term.html

Headteachers proposed a blueprint to vaccinate all teachers and staff so that pupils can go back after Feb half term. Ministers yet to respond.

I have read thread after thread after thread of teachers saying they don't feel safe, don't have ppe, worried about getting sick in small classrooms where they can't socially distance.

Yes. That's because it was true. However those threads were not about closing schools, but about making them safer to work in. That's a common (deliberate?) misconception bandied about on here.

Then the unions at the beginning of January telling teachers to refuse to work due to their own personal safety.

One union told primary school teachers to refuse to work in unsafe conditions during a massive peak of a pandemic in which infection rates in the population were sky high. This concern was validated when the government then agreed that it was a stupid idea to have schools open and closed them to most students after one day back at school. The government have since then been widely derided for their decision to have infected kids mix freely for one day particularly now the death rate is sky high.

Now after the suggestion of vaccinating teachers to make them safe, all the teachers on here are saying it's not actually about their personal safety it's about supposed community transmission among children.

Yes, the government didn't close schools because of concerns about teacher safety, but because they finally admitted what teachers had known all along - schools aren't safe and are vectors for transmission. Teachers have known that teachers have been catching covid from schoolchildren; what was released in a SAGE report over Christmas was that family members are also disproportionately at risk from children, who were, due to mixing freely at school, the most infected subset of the population and this is why schools closed.

Therefore, because teachers aren't idiots, they know that schools aren't safe for either teachers or the communities around them and that vaccinating teachers in order to open schools after half term when infection levels are still really high is a stupid idea.

I'm sure that teachers would be happy to be a priority for vaccination at a later time where community levels of transmission will be low enough for it to be a sensible decision to re-open schools and with additional mitigation measures in place so that transmission in schools doesn't go out of control like it did before Christmas. I'm sure that primary staff who are in schools in unsafe conditions at the moment due to idiotic government decisions would like the vaccine right now. Along with nursery workers and special school teachers.

This plan is not that. Which is why teachers are disagreeing with it.

I saw a headline in the Express ( l hate the Express so didn’t read it) saying Boris has said schools won’t open at 1/2 term.

Gobbolino

Firstly, it won't be all the same teachers posting on every thread. We're not a hive mind and don't have the same Feeling a and opinions. For example, I have never felt unsafe in school, have worn a mask for months and have never supported school closures. I am against the vaccination plan, not because it wouldn't help individual teachers, but because it wouldn't help the country as a whole. Which is the point of the programme.

2. Those teachers who have posted about being unsafe in school AND disagree with priority vaccination are able to see both issues simultaneously. They might be very grateful and happy to get a vaccine but still be aware that it's pointless on a macro level. The schools shut because of community transmission not teacher safety. We all know that.

Bloody brilliantly proposal. Come on Boris and back it.

Here is my post from the 28th December.

*At this point, I don't think it's really about whether teachers get vaccinated or not.

If students are not vaccinated, then we are going to have exponential spread when they take this new, much more contagious variant back to their families. The important thing isn't about protecting a single group of people, the important thing is about limiting spread as a whole and ensuring that we are not overwhelmed by the number of seriously ill and dying.

Sure, you can vaccinate teachers, but you cannot limit the virus to circulating only amongst students.*

@ThornAmongstRoses somebody talking sense!

I find the assumption on the part of these headteachers that all teachers would be given the vaccination interesting. Apart from all the other reasons for this being a senseless idea what happens if all teachers don't want the vaccine?

I’d be worried about the intelligence levels of the staff behind this. The whole issue is community transmission risk 🤦🏽‍♀️. Government don’t care about staff safety as evidenced by past year. Bizarre proposal.

@MartiniDry

I find the assumption on the part of these headteachers that all teachers would be given the vaccination interesting. Apart from all the other reasons for this being a senseless idea what happens if all teachers don't want the vaccine?

Why wouldn't they? Can't wait for my turn whenever that may be

Totally agree on need to vaccinate teachers but schools are closed to minimise community spread NOT to protect the teachers!

I absolutely think that teachers should be made a priority group for vaccination but the idea that that is possible because a group of heads have a bit of space and a free weekend is ludicrous.
There are priority groups for a reason and I don't think it's right to move any profession up the list because of pressure from some well known heads. If the list needs rejigging, then it should be.
There's also the fact that neither of the vaccines will stop me catching covid, or passing it on if I do. So we're still going to have bubbles bursting and high rates of absence.

I will be very happy to be vaccinated when that day comes. Schools aren’t closed because teachers might die though, so giving them vaccinations so they are less at risk of dying, is not going to open schools.

Schools are shut because we are in Alert level 5 and lockdown-plus closing schools to most pupils-is an effective way to reduce community transmission.

Opening schools when community rates are still high is a mistake whether school staff are vaccinated or not. That won’t suddenly make it possible or sensible for schools to open-it’s no magic wand.

@Oaktree55

I’d be worried about the intelligence levels of the staff behind this. The whole issue is community transmission risk 🤦🏽‍♀️. Government don’t care about staff safety as evidenced by past year. Bizarre proposal.

The group behind this and those that support the plan are probably in normal times far removed from the hardships that affect our society. It's an alien concept that their lives should be inconvenienced by this dreadful pandemic a moment longer. It's clear that their proposals do not address the glaring fact that our schools have been vectors of transmission. The arrogance to suggest vaccinating staff and thereby making schools safe is pathetic and highlights a lack of any consideration for the wider community.

@Monkeytennis97

Well, as I said, I'm up for being vaccinated 100% but it's not going to change the rates in kids and their parents and in the community.

That’s exactly how I feel, Monkeytennis. I’d be willing to go back into school and teach rather than working from home if I am vaccinated but I am throwing the rest if you to the lions by doing so. I’d grab it though.

Great to hear teachers are being protected by vaccination but they are not the main problem of the spread in school. Its the children who are carrying the virus, some asymptomatic and other become symptomatic, and passing it onto their families . If one member of their family displays symptoms then that's quarantine for the whole family. Children will still be missing put on about 2 weeks of education.

It's the asymptomatic children that are the most dangerous, they will come into contact with their family, their form group and friends at school. By the time one of them displays symptoms its too late as the asymptomatic child will have passed it onto many other children at this point.

I didn't spot this was in the Corona topic and thought it was going to be about a headteacher asking the OP to marry him.

@mrshoho I hope staff in your school are recognised as carers and therefore vaccinated soon. In my county special school staff are being vaccinated from next week.

Vaccination should be prioritised for those who need it not a blanket decision for all school staff.

Yes @Busygoingblah many local authorities are categorising us as health workers so we should be called for vaccination in the next few weeks.

@P1neapple5

Shop staff are protected by plastic screens. Other professionals aren’t squashed in rooms with limited ventilation and 30 children all day long. The children not in school need to go back ASAP.

You may visit schools but how much sitting in classrooms are you doing? If you’re visiting you will be kept from classrooms and not experiencing the implications for staff in schools on a daily basis.

NHS office staff working from home aren’t exceptional or even on the front line but are getting vaccinations.

Not all shop staff are behind screens - my husband is retail. Works on shop floor. He has just had covid caught from work (we haven't seen a soul since Christmas eve until he went back to work- 2 whole weeks he had off), now my 18 year old autistic dd has picked it up from him.

I am all for teachers being vaccinate but they are not the only non nhs workers at risk.