Schools in meltdown. Put your kids in masks

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Long story short

First case May 10.
By May 17 th, half of all year groups at home. Many staff sick. Some departments have no staff at all. Some students sent home for lack of staff, rather than quarantine.
20th May. School closed. Half term brought forward one week
31 May. Reopen.
1 June several more cases identified
3rd June. All lower school sent home. Year 10 and 12 kept in only. Masks, which had been optional, are now made compulsory again. Too late
7th June. School closed again. I am now teaching online

So in the last few weeks, I have spent 3x longer on COVID related activities than on teaching. Including trying to get students home when classes close, and they can’t use public transport. Teaching doubled up classes, 30 online, and 30 in front of me, because there are hardly any staff in. Administering tests. Taking students to and from the testing site. Recording results. Cramming information in subjects I know nothing about, but have been told I am about to teach. Much of the time students have just been told to read in silence, while we get on with our main business, as a covid testing site.

So please put masks on your children. There is no reason for a secondary aged child not to have a mask on their face, and a spare in their bag, and a spare spare.

And please support what’s schools are trying to do to enforce masks.

I see so many posts of mothers up in arms about masks. We are desperately fighting to keep education going, and we need your support

I belong to a MAT composed of 3 large secondary schools. Within our 3 schools we have:

A 15 year old boy who developed type 1 diabetes when he caught Covid

An 18 year old girl who lost most of her hearing through covid

A 14 year old boy whose heart has been left so damaged by covid he might need a transplant.

It’s heartbreaking.

Kids at ds's school are still wearing masks as requested by the head and testing twice a week. I think teachers have been put at great risk and no one seems to really give a shit.
The idea that people can't afford to have a mask and eat is laughable as they can still use the same mask they were wearing when it was mandatory if they just wash it!

Believe me, some people can't afford masks . There was a story on here last year about someone seeing a homeless woman who didn't have one picking up someone's discarded mask and putting it on to go into a shop. So it's really not laughable that some people can't afford masks. In fact I'd say that's heartbreaking.

Cases mean nothing.
No to masks for children
If you have been vaccinated what’s the problem ?
Testing healthy ppl is ridiculous and just keeps this shit show going
I feel gutted for people suffering other illnesses snd MH problems when we are being held to ransom by this government over an endemic virus

My dc senior school is a huge state one. 1500 students. Since they've been back open there has Been 4 cases.
Prior to LD1.. No cases.

Oh do one.

@WaverleyPirate

Vast majority of other jobs don't cram into tiny room with lots of unmasked people.

It's a failure if employer protection in my view. If they are not needed why do other people have masks at work?

I'm not bashing teachers! But plenty of other jobs are similar. It's not just teachers. For example my workplace is an office environment, admittedly larger than the average classroom but not large. It has around 30 staff seated at desks, with members of the public coming for appointments all day - maybe 150 customers a day? Customers are supposed to wear masks, many don't. Staff are supposed to put their masks on when walking around and can take them off when seated. Some desks are screened, others aren't. Staff interviewing for anything up to 40 minutes at a time, face to face with customer. chair gets a quick wipe between customers. Teachers are not as well protected as they could be. But the 'Covid-safe' precautions in many jobs are just lip service. The tiny screens in most shops aren't doing anything.

@Lostinacloud

But so what if half of teachers aren’t vaccinated? Since most adults under 65 will get little to no symptoms, who cares? Do they all take the flu vaccine each year? Or get a chicken pox vaccine if they’ve never had it before? I’m not bashing teachers, I’m just trying to restore some perspective. You have clearly been influenced by the ‘stay at home’ crew and so think anyone who gets covid will end up on a ventilator of dead.

Err yes, I think you will find most teachers are vaccinated against flu every year, and are vaccinated or otherwise immune to chicken pox. In some schools, hepatitis vaccines are also compulsory, and of course teachers are quite often exposed to TB and may need screening and vaccinating for that too.

I don’t understand your question, tbf.

@Lostinacloud

And schools wouldn’t have to close or pupils isolate if the country stopped being obsessed with covid and got on with life as before. Occasionally a pupil or two would be off ill and then be back in and maybe they had covid, or maybe they had a cold, or hand foot and mouth or chicken pox or a bit of a gastro bug doing the rounds. Oh hang on, that’s how it used to be. Can’t possibly go back to that when there’s a different coronavirus circulating….

And we have 3 children permanently disabled. In one MAT. 2 with conditions that are potentially life limiting

No sorry I still can’t buy into your argument because this whole virus has been overhyped and we do not need to be treating it any differently to a standard coronavirus, which is how it affects practically all children and even most adults under 65.

To date non of my DC had to isolate.
I only know 2 people who actually had covid - and looking at their rule floundering it's not surprising.
We need to get on with life. There will always be some horror stories about things that go wrong.

@Lostinacloud

No sorry I still can’t buy into your argument because this whole virus has been overhyped and we do not need to be treating it any differently to a standard coronavirus, which is how it affects practically all children and even most adults under 65.

Standard Coronovirus is a cold

Thank you for posting OP and I’m not surprised at the number of posters still sticking their fingers in their ears because nothing has affected them directly.
I am sorry your school has had to close and I am sorry to all those children and young people who are now having to educate remotely. That alone is a big scandal and shocking it’s not being more reported in the media (but then holidays abroad are more important to focus on though, right!?) but again, most posters/public don’t care because it’s not their school closing.
Did anyone notice the Jill Biden and Duchess photos yesterday in a school? They were wearing masks but the teachers/staff standing right next to them were not as they were following govt guidance. Hope that magic force field around school staff is strong.

Simply not the case that I don’t care because the OP’s situation isn’t directly affecting me. What about this poor guy? I don’t know him at all but this one tweet from his totally breaks my heart and adds even more to my resolve that this whole situation is overhyped, wrong, damaging, unfair, disproportionate, cruel and massively detrimental to people’s lives, health and stability.

And SARS-cov2 is a coronavirus and in most cases, a cold!

I don't want my child in a mask forever.. because let's face it - covid isn't going anywhere!

I've never heard of teachers having to be vaccinated against hepatitis.

As a teacher I never had a flu jab.

And Tb? I was vaccinated against that as a teenager.

@Lostinacloud

Simply not the case that I don’t care because the OP’s situation isn’t directly affecting me. What about this poor guy? I don’t know him at all but this one tweet from his totally breaks my heart and adds even more to my resolve that this whole situation is overhyped, wrong, damaging, unfair, disproportionate, cruel and massively detrimental to people’s lives, health and stability.

Couldn’t agree more. How many times do we have to tell people that catching Covid is not the only tragedy one could suffer from.

Thank you for posting OP and I’m not surprised at the number of posters still sticking their fingers in their ears because nothing has affected them directly

I don't stick my fingers in my ears. I look around me.

I know about the risks of covid. So far we have been living by the rules set by government. (Let's just not question their actions.)
But the truth is, the majority of people will have mild symptoms, if any. Simply testing positive does not automatically mean hospital treatment or death.
We really need to put things into perspective.
We have an extensive vaccination programme that will offer a good level of protection. As with many other viral diseases.

I don't understand why we are not hearing about these teenagers in the news. If children are genuinely being left with disabilities or other issues after having Covid, why isn't it more widely known?

It’s a massive cover up. There’s hundreds and hundreds of young people in hospital or severely ill and somehow it’s being kept out of the press 🙄.

Do you know what. I would actually love to see some data on this. Actual evidence. Otherwise it’s just speculation which is not helpful at the moment.

That's what I'm saying @Delatron

@LostThings

I don't understand why we are not hearing about these teenagers in the news. If children are genuinely being left with disabilities or other issues after having Covid, why isn't it more widely known?

Because its bullshit made up by people who absolutely love lockdown and want us shut in forever

Yes I’m agreeing with you @Lostinacloud
It’s a good point!

Maybe the people accused of ‘sticking their fingers in their ears’ are just more accurately able to asses personal risk?