Schools - what are you expecting?

[DBML]

I’m a teacher and throughout November and December our school was hit badly by Covid. We had all year groups off, at least 50 confirmed cases in pupils. Tens of staff off confirmed. One member of staff passed Covid on to a parent who then passed away. One learner passed Covid to her mother who passed away. We had 2 children seriously ill in hospital, luckily now recovered. Horrendous is not a word I use lightly, but it became frightening and eventually unsustainable.

Because some groups were in and others out, remote learning was patchy and difficult to manage. I caught Covid after having a year 7 in my class who tested positive and I was ill for about 7 - 10 days, so quite mild luckily. But I couldn’t breath easily and had panic attacks. Was unable to sleep laying down and was convinced that I had no air. It was awful.

‘Us for them’ is campaigning for us to go back to this again. No safety measures in place...just a full reopening and having been there, I cannot understand why?

I know many posters here want school’s ‘reopened’ again too and as quickly as possible. I was wondering whether rather than just say ‘schools must open’ someone could explain.

I get that home learning is not ideal; can be inconsistent and that working from home is challenging when children are there. I get that parents are worried about their children’s and their own mental health...I get it, because I am trying to work full time and am a parent too. But, having seen how bad schools can get, I also accept that tolerating this situation until cases are right down is necessary.

I don’t want to die. I don’t want my husband to die. I don’t want my son to get seriously sick. I don’t want my pupils to get sick or to lose parents. I don’t want to return to school without anything there to keep us safe. We were not safe.

I was wondering what those who want schools to just open are expecting? Are you expecting children not to catch it? Not to pass it about? Are you willing for some teachers, parents and pupils to die because it will only be a very small percentage and a price worth paying? Are you happy to put up with the endless isolations and then reduced quality of online learning?

And if you just want ‘normality’ do you realise that’s just not possible?

Genuinely interested in the reasoning and not just the statement ‘schools need to open’.

On the other end of the scale: our school of 800 didn't have a single case. Why did we have to shut when our numbers have been so low in our area?! I don't know what the solution is but a blanket school closure is great! Open in tier 1&2, key years in tier 3, and closed in 4? I don't know!

The worst thing was that we were doing great! We’d been inspected and commended for our H&S procedures and we’re held up as a shining example for other schools. We hadn’t had a single case and we’re feeling quite smug when other local schools were closing year groups left, right and centre. The year groups dropped like flies over a period of just a few weeks. There was a fair bit of panic and confusion about the online learning and we just couldn’t believe things got so bad so quickly.

Isn't this quite private information about the family?

Then suddenly we had our first case, quickly followed by others...all originating from the same family with children in different year groups. Not their fault, they didn’t know at first and it came from their parents who brought it from a factory outbreak. They all isolated after a positive test, but it was too late. Pupils got sick, followed by staff.
^ This?

@PocketsGalore

I don’t think so.

I see sporadic and random attempts to get kids in school, confusion among parents, schedules that are simply unworkable for parents with children spread over different schools or different year groups, sudden changes to plans that seem to come out of the blue that are either illogical, unnecessarily stringent, or just uncoordinated with things happening elsewhere in society. I see more worry amongst parents about their children's education, I see stress in children (given to them by their parents and their teachers) and I see out televisions telling us that our children's future is bleak.

So, if you want to know what is going to happen over the next year, look at what has happened over the past year.

Here is what I am doing.

1. I am no telling my child that their future is bleak. The world they will work in will be as alien to me as the idea that 1000 people would catch a bus to an office block and work there all day will be to them.
2. I am not telling my child that an exam mark will get them a job or a place a University. I'm also not telling the that a University degree will get them a job. People pay other people for value. Nothing else. People employ people who can do things (even if that is ticking a box), nothing else.

In my opinion, if we raise happy and confident children, and they are intelligent and enthusiastic about the world around them, regardless of how much we try to destroy the world around them, they will win.

@ElliFAntspoo

I see sporadic and random attempts to get kids in school, confusion among parents, schedules that are simply unworkable for parents with children spread over different schools or different year groups, sudden changes to plans that seem to come out of the blue that are either illogical, unnecessarily stringent, or just uncoordinated with things happening elsewhere in society. I see more worry amongst parents about their children's education, I see stress in children (given to them by their parents and their teachers) and I see out televisions telling us that our children's future is bleak.

So, if you want to know what is going to happen over the next year, look at what has happened over the past year.

Here is what I am doing.

1. I am no telling my child that their future is bleak. The world they will work in will be as alien to me as the idea that 1000 people would catch a bus to an office block and work there all day will be to them.
2. I am not telling my child that an exam mark will get them a job or a place a University. I'm also not telling the that a University degree will get them a job. People pay other people for value. Nothing else. People employ people who can do things (even if that is ticking a box), nothing else.

In my opinion, if we raise happy and confident children, and they are intelligent and enthusiastic about the world around them, regardless of how much we try to destroy the world around them, they will win.

Great post.

Why can't we have a tiered system based on levels? Our school and area was minimally affected. 3 staff members caught it, none seriously. 8 pupils total. 2 year groups had 2 weeks off, the rest of the time everyone was in. Why do we have to close because other schools have it bad?

In my opinion, if we raise happy and confident children, and they are intelligent and enthusiastic about the world around them, regardless of how much we try to destroy the world around them, they will win.

I agree with this so much, very wise post! But let's not underestimate that the lack of social interactions is incredibly detrimental for dc development and mental health. I'm not too worried about the academic side of things but the social skills and lacking essential human contact.

@bathsh3ba

Why can't we have a tiered system based on levels? Our school and area was minimally affected. 3 staff members caught it, none seriously. 8 pupils total. 2 year groups had 2 weeks off, the rest of the time everyone was in. Why do we have to close because other schools have it bad?

Because we already know that when you tell people the rules are different depending on who you are and where you live, everyone does what the F they like and no-one knows what the F is happening.

What do you do? Stop schools employing anyone outside of a 15 mile radius? Stop schools employing teachers who have spouses who work in areas of greater risk? Stop children who have a parent who works in a high risk area from going to school in a low risk area?

And what do you do about all the people and children who don't give a F in high risk areas? The people who live in those areas know they are in a bad area because they chose to live with idiots, and you then have 'safer' areas with few restrictions right next to them showing them what life could be like if they could just stop the the idiots in their own communities from ignoring their rules.

No, you can't play politics and postcode lotteries with people just because some people want to and others don't.

Everyone knows this virus could have been eliminates 10 months ago if people wanted it to. Everyone knows this country could be virus free in 30-40 days if people wanted it it. But nobody wants it to be gone if it means greater inconvenience to them and their lives.

The the transmission mechanic is very simple, and it has never changed. To get infected, it has to go in through the holes in your face. If you effectively filter the air that goes into your mouth and nose, and you prevent contaminants entering your eyes, you are 99% clear of risk. If you then remove yourself from high risk environments that reaches near 100% safety. We know that this is a 30-40 day infection cycle with a 3 week contamination period at the beginning. We know that the virus can survive on cold metal surfaces for up to 14 days.

All you have to do is prevent one person from passing the virus to another person for 30 days at the outside, and prevent contaminated people and goods entering the country, and you end the virus.

Of course, you then end up with a virus free country, but if you are the only virus free country in a world full of virus ridden populations, you can no longer operate or interact face to face with the rest of the world except via computer.

I expect the case numbers to drop significantly by the end of February due to the lockdown. By the beginning of March most people would would be a higher risk from Covid will be developing immunity from the vaccine. I expect the hospitalisation numbers to be plummeting. At that point I think it would be reasonable to open schools even if on a rota system to the Easter holidays or perhaps primary schools who can do smaller class bubbles than secondary schools are able to do and whose parents need the childcare and also to exam years.

Schools should be the first to open so if we keep up some/most of the other measures and of course the vaccine program then I would hope numbers (especially in hospital and deaths) would stay low. By the summer term many more people will be immune due to vaccines and the warm weather will be on our side. Schools could be fully open then.

@PocketsGalore

In my opinion, if we raise happy and confident children, and they are intelligent and enthusiastic about the world around them, regardless of how much we try to destroy the world around them, they will win.

I agree with this so much, very wise post! But let's not underestimate that the lack of social interactions is incredibly detrimental for dc development and mental health. I'm not too worried about the academic side of things but the social skills and lacking essential human contact.

So maybe the next generation end up kookier than we would like. Maybe their priorities in regard to personal relationships are different. Maybe they are less willing to put up with some of the shit we accept as being normal in a relationship. Maybe they stigmas and norms of relationships change. Maybe 'the spectrum' broadens. Maybe the impending increase in loopiness and idiosyncrasies amongst the young is where the new ideas are to be found. Regardless. It is not our future to choose. It is theirs to build.

@SerenadeOfTheSchoolRun

I expect the case numbers to drop significantly by the end of February due to the lockdown. By the beginning of March most people would would be a higher risk from Covid will be developing immunity from the vaccine. I expect the hospitalisation numbers to be plummeting. At that point I think it would be reasonable to open schools even if on a rota system to the Easter holidays or perhaps primary schools who can do smaller class bubbles than secondary schools are able to do and whose parents need the childcare and also to exam years.

Schools should be the first to open so if we keep up some/most of the other measures and of course the vaccine program then I would hope numbers (especially in hospital and deaths) would stay low. By the summer term many more people will be immune due to vaccines and the warm weather will be on our side. Schools could be fully open then.

At what point do you vaccinate the teachers? At what point do you explain to people that the vaccine does not meant that they cannot catch, incubate, transmit and infect other people with the virus? All the vaccine does is reduce their personal experience getting ill.

Or have you made the mistake of thinking the vaccine prevents people from catching and spreading Covid?

So good to see people actually want schools to reopen with some safety measures this time.
What the usforthem group did was disgraceful and put so many teachers / children’s family’s in danger.
I also can categorically say I caught my covid from school. We had six cases in my class all following on from the first one. We were all in isolation , my first symptom was a week after the first. One child passed it on to all her family and grandparents. I was particularly poorly and ended up in hospital.
My dd y11 isolated four times. It actually almost broke her. It was that bad in her year group she only returned to school for four days in between one lot of isolation.

Most teachers are not in the vulnerable age bracket

Are you sure? I’m a 57 year old teacher. Loads and loads of older staff in my school. Not every teacher is a twenty something.

*At what point do you vaccinate the teachers?
At what point do you explain to people that the vaccine does not meant that they cannot catch, incubate, transmit and infect other people with the virus? All the vaccine does is reduce their personal experience getting ill.

Or have you made the mistake of thinking the vaccine prevents people from catching and spreading Covid?*

If I was in charge I would vaccinate teachers around the same time as the clinically vulnerable which I think is at priority group 6 but we should probably think about factory workers and food shop workers too and it would mean the over 50-64 year olds waiting longer. Also it would be great to vaccinate teachers but the children would still pass the virus between each other and take it home to their families so in the big picture it wouldn't reduce transmission that much. Ideally teachers and would all be vaccinated three weeks before schools went back which would protect them and their families.

They are explaining to people that there is not yet any evidence that the vaccine reduces the risk of transmission but my guess is that it will. I have no evidence so agree we need to keep social distancing and hence my comment about strict class group bubbles in primary school and/or rotas and perhaps only exam years in secondary school prior to Easter.

You are suggesting that I have made a mistake but actually there is no evidence that the vaccine does not reduce the risk of people from spreading covid. The measles vaccine does a good job of stopping people from spreading measles for example so, being optimistic, I imagine that it will.

Thanks everyone. I’ve spent a few evenings doom scrolling and getting worked up at some of the posts people write. I follow Us for Them on Twitter (I know, I know) and they give me the rage. One person actually posted that teachers were “more preoccupied with their own risk and health concerns than the future of their students” Duh! Obviously!?

But actually I’m preoccupied with my health, that of my family and that of my students who I often see more and worry about more than my own extended family. When I hear about the death of ‘Joe Bloggs’ from Staffordshire, I think ‘there’s sad’...but when I hear that Bobby Brown in my Bio class has lost his mum, it’s unbearable.

I’m grateful that posters here spent time explaining what they wanted to see happen and it’s (for the most part) reassuring that most people actually want the same thing, schools open as safely as they can be and staff protected with vaccinations. Personally I feel the kids and their families also deserve that vaccination too, but it’s nice that people deem school staff to be deserving of protection. I also imagined that most posters would say they want schools open ‘now’, but most actually are willing to wait a little bit for cases to come down. I think everyone just wants a little light at the end of the tunnel and that’s fair enough.

Anyway, thanks again!

@SerenadeOfTheSchoolRun

*At what point do you vaccinate the teachers? At what point do you explain to people that the vaccine does not meant that they cannot catch, incubate, transmit and infect other people with the virus? All the vaccine does is reduce their personal experience getting ill.

Or have you made the mistake of thinking the vaccine prevents people from catching and spreading Covid?*

If I was in charge I would vaccinate teachers around the same time as the clinically vulnerable which I think is at priority group 6 but we should probably think about factory workers and food shop workers too and it would mean the over 50-64 year olds waiting longer. Also it would be great to vaccinate teachers but the children would still pass the virus between each other and take it home to their families so in the big picture it wouldn't reduce transmission that much. Ideally teachers and would all be vaccinated three weeks before schools went back which would protect them and their families.

They are explaining to people that there is not yet any evidence that the vaccine reduces the risk of transmission but my guess is that it will. I have no evidence so agree we need to keep social distancing and hence my comment about strict class group bubbles in primary school and/or rotas and perhaps only exam years in secondary school prior to Easter.

You are suggesting that I have made a mistake but actually there is no evidence that the vaccine does not reduce the risk of people from spreading covid. The measles vaccine does a good job of stopping people from spreading measles for example so, being optimistic, I imagine that it will.

Okay....

We vaccinate every year for what we believe are going to be the dominant corona virus strains that year. All flus are corona viruses. They cannot be destroyed. They cannot be eliminated. H1N1, the most common flu strain, is The Spanish Flu. 100 years ago it was what we are talking about now. It was world wide and killing millions. Now we all have a level of immunity and we pass that immunity on to our children. Those who experienced it first hand and could not build immunity lived in fear and died. Their children built immunity and passed that on to their children and the world became largely immune to the deadly influences of H1N1.

But million and millions of people catch H1N1 every year and pass it to other people and either don't get ill, or get mildly ill. We give the old injections to try to minimise the deadly effects this virus can induce.

But we have studied this most basic virus for over a hundred years and never managed find any way whatsoever to prevent it from being transmitted or carried by humans. We have only ever managed to reduce the influence it has on the human body, and only ever for a very short period of time. Hence OAPs get flu shots every year when their health requires it.

And now you think we are so intelligent as a species that we can not only hold at bay the attacks of this new type of virus. A corona virus with so much gain of function over all previous viruses that it has staggered the scientific world. But you think we have also cracked the century long problem of how to stop the multiplication of the genomic?

We already know how to not get infected - do not insert it into your eyes, nose or mouth. It is that simple.

But if you are going to let it in through your eyes nose or mouth, then pretending other people can't carry the virus and 'are safe', and telling people that everyone they meet will be safe and not to worry, is just ignorant.

‘ The union figures are that school staff are 3x more likely to die than the general population, when school are open’

Is this presented as a serious argument? Never mind the official ONS figures. Let’s just make some up?
Love
The Unions

I would love for my year 11 dd to be back in school as soon as possible, and she would love to be back too, but I don't want it to happen until it's genuinely safe for schools to re-open.

Education is hugely important, of course, and remote learning is far from ideal. The impact on mental health is also important. However, we cannot just throw teachers under the bus, and as things stand, schools are not safe. Allowing the virus to spread unchecked would just put teachers and other school staff at risk, as well as children, their parents and ultimately the NHS.

I think more needs to be done to support the kids who are really struggling with the current situation, but realistically, the majority will have to wait a bit longer.

I would like to see teachers and other school staff higher up on the priority list for the vaccine, and I'd like to see better safety measures in school. However, I accept that the current situation means that they will have to stay closed for the majority of children for a while yet.

@bathsh3ba

Why can't we have a tiered system based on levels? Our school and area was minimally affected. 3 staff members caught it, none seriously. 8 pupils total. 2 year groups had 2 weeks off, the rest of the time everyone was in. Why do we have to close because other schools have it bad?

Because if you hadn’t closed you could have been the next one in line for disaster

@Doublefaced

‘ The union figures are that school staff are 3x more likely to die than the general population, when school are open’

Is this presented as a serious argument? Never mind the official ONS figures. Let’s just make some up?
Love
The Unions

It’s not ‘made up’. And you should be asking yourself why the so called ‘official figures’ are counting teacher deaths over a 9 month period when schools were open for only 3 months of that. Teachers have a slightly raised death rate when compared to professions exposed to the virus for 3 times as long What sense does that make? And the worst thing about the situation teachers are in is the sheer number of people they can spread it to. No other professionals are standing up in cramped, poorly ventilated rooms and addressing 30 other people at once for an hour at a time. 1 teacher could pass it on to over 100 others in a dingle day, easily

@ElliFantspoo. I am not going to quote your post because it so so completely scientifically wrong that I don’t want to be responsible for it appearing twice. Starting from flu is not a corona virus, you don’t inherit immunity and it isn’t ‘basic’. Why do do many people with no training and education in virology at all consider themselves experts as soon as they read any old dross online?

My kids school was largely unaffected. 15 positive cases in a school of 2000, mostly kids, no one seriously ill. The kids wore masks all day, teachers in masks too, windows open. Each year group had one day of home learning a week. I’m not sure it’s a good idea to go back yet but I definitely want mine back this year at some point.

I've always been against school closures. I'm not in favour of opening with no safety measures but I don't think remote education is education.

I think everyone's views are coloured by their experiences. What DBML and Rowena describe is about as far removed from my experience as a horror film.

The school I work in hasn't had a single known case in either staff or child right from Feb 2020 to today. Last term for us was great. Yes, there were restrictions on what we could do but the children were all in school, happy and learning normally. They weren't scared because they saw nothing to make them scared. We struggled to make our KS3 children follow the rules at all. They believed children couldn't get it because that's what the media told them and the didn't see anything different. We had sports events, concerts, productions (no audiences of course, all livestreamed), children took exams, we had large outdoor gatherings, our boarding house operated normally and school life was generally lived normally (new normal).

When that is your lived experience of Covid in schools it's very hard to believe how bad it was for others and hard to accept remote learning as an acceptable alternative. The media talked about burst bubbles and repeated isolation a lot. It did not talk about maimed, bereaved, traumatised, hospitalised children and multiple deaths in single schools. Those experiences are things I've only heard about from teachers here. It seems like something that's happened in another world.

I also experienced covid safety measures. We have well ventilated classrooms, we wear masks in classrooms if we want to and our largest class is 18 children. The classrooms are smaller but all big enough to distance from the children if we wanted to. I taught outside for all of September because my subject wasn't allowed to go ahead in a normal fashion. We have 2 outdoor classrooms. I was aware that this was not the case in all school's but I never felt afraid or unsafe in school. So the feeling if 'Schools aren't safe, we must close' didn't hit me.

I'm not saying that closing schools was the wrong decision. Just explaining how it's possible to feel they should be open. If you are lucky enough to have been sheltered from outbreaks, you don't know about the opposite experience unless you happen to hear about it from others. There's a 'my school feels safe + govt says schools are safe = we should be open' mindset that doesn't burst easily.

@manicinsomniac

I've always been against school closures. I'm not in favour of opening with no safety measures but I don't think remote education is education.

I think everyone's views are coloured by their experiences. What DBML and Rowena describe is about as far removed from my experience as a horror film.

The school I work in hasn't had a single known case in either staff or child right from Feb 2020 to today. Last term for us was great. Yes, there were restrictions on what we could do but the children were all in school, happy and learning normally. They weren't scared because they saw nothing to make them scared. We struggled to make our KS3 children follow the rules at all. They believed children couldn't get it because that's what the media told them and the didn't see anything different. We had sports events, concerts, productions (no audiences of course, all livestreamed), children took exams, we had large outdoor gatherings, our boarding house operated normally and school life was generally lived normally (new normal).

When that is your lived experience of Covid in schools it's very hard to believe how bad it was for others and hard to accept remote learning as an acceptable alternative. The media talked about burst bubbles and repeated isolation a lot. It did not talk about maimed, bereaved, traumatised, hospitalised children and multiple deaths in single schools. Those experiences are things I've only heard about from teachers here. It seems like something that's happened in another world.

I also experienced covid safety measures. We have well ventilated classrooms, we wear masks in classrooms if we want to and our largest class is 18 children. The classrooms are smaller but all big enough to distance from the children if we wanted to. I taught outside for all of September because my subject wasn't allowed to go ahead in a normal fashion. We have 2 outdoor classrooms. I was aware that this was not the case in all school's but I never felt afraid or unsafe in school. So the feeling if 'Schools aren't safe, we must close' didn't hit me.

I'm not saying that closing schools was the wrong decision. Just explaining how it's possible to feel they should be open. If you are lucky enough to have been sheltered from outbreaks, you don't know about the opposite experience unless you happen to hear about it from others. There's a 'my school feels safe + govt says schools are safe = we should be open' mindset that doesn't burst easily.

Our school experience was similar.

I believe all the bad experiences of course, and although I'd love my dcs to be back at school I'm aware that my privilege keeps us sheltered, so happy to do whatever is best for all.