Surely it should not be beyond the wit of mankind/the DfE...

[drspouse]

to find large spaces to hold schools in that mean they can be socially distanced and/or in rotas?
Surely?
My DCs' schools are quite close together (primary but two different schools) and one is opposite a closed (well, distance learning) college. There are 2 secondary schools within walking distance and you could easily fit all of the primary years 4-6 plus half of the secondary schools into the college classrooms at 15 per regular sized classroom (or a whole class of 30 in a lecture hall).
Then the remaining pupils could socially distance and years R-3 could split into half sized groups (given we don't think they are very infectious but they are poorer at socially distancing and more likely to run riot on a college campus/break a village hall).

It would require the DfE to get their act together and provide:
Individual technology for the secondary school pupils and a classroom setup for the primary teachers plus portable equipment for the primary teachers.
Minibuses from each village/town area for each year (e.g. you'd have Year 7 Lower Wallop bus and Year 8 Hill Estate Bus) that serves the secondary school pupils (to get them to the college without being together on a bus and IMPORTANTLY to get them home again without congregating all together in town.)
DBS checks for all maintenance/caretaking staff on the college campus and in any other halls used.
Weekly PCR tests for all staff and ditto all secondary school pupils unless exempt.
Employing a full time TA per primary class of 30 so that half of them could have the TA and half the teacher and then swap over.
Mobile connections for all secondary pupils (where it's not e.g. a college) and for primary teachers' equipment.

What else have I forgotten that is actually just a matter of money not impossibility?

The primary school my DD is in also has 2 church halls in walking distance and there are others around and about.

I know not ALL schools could use other halls but surely it's better to send SOME children back rather than NO children back?

@thecatfromjapan

The thing is, it has been managed in other countries.

So, for all the people saying it's impossible - well, the clear counter-argument is that it clearly is possible.

As Piggy said, up-thread, it hasn't proved to be enough to keep schools open without any closures, but it's certainly helped keep schools more open, and keep transmission rates lower.

And, sadly, if these new mutations of the virus are indeed worrying, it may well be that we do need to do this. We'll need to do something. 🤷‍♀️

In other countries it has been managed largely by:

A) keeping schools closed. Many countries have not yet reopened since closing last March. Not for anyone, key worker, vulnerable or anything

B) proper hygiene. Social distancing, masks for all. Windows all open at all times. Rota systems, limiting classes to around 8 children

C) no longer making schools compulsory. Common in European countries, ( eg Sweden)Where reports that ‘schools are open to all’ is more than a little misleading, ad most parents are chiding not to use them

D) blended learning

E) but mostly, simply keeping schools closed. Many countries made the decision last summer that schools would remain closed for the year, and the countries I have most involvement with do not have reliable internet. They have provided students with text books.

Uk was very unusual in its rush to reopen schools fully without protections. And we are reaping the consequences

@Onlinedilema

Weaponised not harmonised.

Thank you. I’m terrible at typing on my phone

Why are non schools less suitable to use as schools than schools?

That's a bit of an unintentionally ironic comment. At the moment, kids are ALREADY being educated in non-school environment---they're called "bedrooms with laptops balanced on the bed while kids sit on the floor and try to work" "kitchen tables covered in half-cleared away breakfast" "living rooms where three kids are trying to use the same laptop with no parental supervision because parents are working."

I guess the point is, it just seems a bit weird to be freaking out about COLLEGE LECTURE HALLS ARE NOT SUITABLE SCHOOL ENVIRONMENTS when kids are already stuck in far less educationally appropriate environments right now, trying to get through schoolwork.

Instead of "making the perfect the enemy of the good" it might have made more sense to have focused on "getting the kids into some sort of version of school, even if it's not perfect." Ie., deal with the fact that the buildings are not always ideal, and if necessary just cut out certain subjects that are very hard to teach in these environments. I'd rather see kids getting through core subjects, even if things like proper PE have to be replaced with mass group exercise sessions for a bit.

Hopefully the kids will go back fairly soon anyway so this will be immaterial.

I know that some areas really struggled Sept- Dec

But in our area, the rates were lowish in Sept, and I have dcs in 2 secondary schools. Both schools bus in kids from smaller towns and villages over a wide area.

The girls' school had 2 times where one class needed to self isolate due to a positve covid test.
The boys school 3 times.

each time it was one class or one group that isolated.
So, out of a total of 2,000 kids there were 5 cases, in 3 months.

Maybe the school was good at keeping everyone separate (the kids were in as small bubbles as possible, so year 7, 8 and 9 mostly in one class bubbles with no mixing at break/lunch)
Maybe because the families/kids were very good at following rules (doubt it if my ds' friedns were anything to go by)
Maybe because the families kept kids at home if there were any symptons, or if anyone else in family was positive (this may be true, schools emphasised it again and again)
Maybe because the rate in the area was low. At height of Nov lockdown the rate was under 150 per 100,000. (now we are at 190)

So, I do think it is entirely possible to just keep schools open, oncethe rates have dropped.
BUT of course the more infectious variant has come in since then.

Actually, I think it was just pure luck that some schools were hot hard and some got away lightly. I Several times heard some colleagues saying their schools were safe, Only to here a week or 2 weeks later that their particular schools were closed due to high numbers of illnesses, even deaths among staff and student families

In my town there are 8 secondary schools, god knows how many primary and no theatres or cinemas or other large areas.
I am the sole specialist of my subject and currently have 150 students in my exam classes 10-13. How would you solve this and allow them to still have my specialist input?
On average at the end of a senior lesson the students then disperse across another 11 or 12 subjects and even then are in more specialist groups. The logistics of timetabling a secondary school in normal times is a near impossibility; OP your suggestion is insane and just lacks any awareness of how secondary schools work.

[quote drspouse]@HadEnoughOfBears surely you are aware of this? To minimise flow in the corridors almost all the pupils were staying in their base and teachers were moving.[/quote]
Nope we weren't. All staff were in their classrooms as normal and the students came to us. It has been observable that there were more infections in static classrooms than when students moved around the school site.

*All HE students are taught remotely as are almost all FE students at the moment. Did anybody think they are in college at the moment??!

We have one night shelter locally in a church hall, nobody uses the other halls or the churches themselves. Does anywhere have every church hall filled with homeless day and night? It's the hall where DS does Cubs normally so it's not even used by the night shelter in the day/early evening.*

.yes college students are at home also due to the pandemic they also need to go back
You seem to think they should stay home but schools go back
My ds needs to finish the practical side of his course as do many others so they also need to go back
They are also 16/17/18 year olds who also deserve an education

We don't have very large church halls here and you still don't get safeguarding

You're not a teacher are you OP.

That's not a question btw: merely an observation.

🙄

Simpke logistics make your suggestion impossible. Can't see any empty buildings near me except for ....schools. And shops. A couple gyms but they are several big rooms full of equipment and no corridors for movement of dozens of kids. A disused theatre but unless 200 kids are learning in one room- love to hear a teachers reaction to that! Plus none of these buildings will have gone through health and safety measures for mass occupation on the level you are talking about (two gyms and a theatre will not be big enough for all the schools in the area).
Amazing how schools have loads of rooms, lots of corridors, toilet facilities and dining halls with kitchens. And are scattered about in different neighbourhoods. Sound ideal to me - though an idea of splitting the population in half to allow social distancing fails as it is super difficult to do half online half real life teaching.

As a teacher I have been on many school threads.

We wanted rotas and masks in classrooms.

We were told children don’t pass on the virus and ‘there have been no cases in my child’s school’.

As someone who teaches in an FE college, I would be heartily unimpressed if it were to open its doors to facilitate younger learners and not the actual year 12 and 13 students who study there.

@toomanypillows

As someone who teaches in an FE college, I would be heartily unimpressed if it were to open its doors to facilitate younger learners and not the actual year 12 and 13 students who study there.

It's mainly HE but calls itself a college.

As someone who teaches in an FE college, I would be heartily unimpressed if it were to open its doors to facilitate younger learners and not the actual year 12 and 13 students who study there.

Absolutely.

I work at a university- can you imagine the uproar if we allowed our campuses to be used to teach school pupils f2f but not our own students who are paying thousands of pounds for their course!