Better late than never - CO2 monitors for classrooms in England

[lannistunut]

www.theguardian.com/education/2021/aug/21/classrooms-england-monitor-air-quality-effort-combat-covid-better-ventilation

Finally the government are taking the first step towards proper ventilation, frustratingly slow and late as ever, but every step forward is progress.

So what would you rather I do as a parent?

Your list of things that you are doing is great, particularly lobbying other parents.

Loads of parents vote Conservative. The only way to effect real change is if the government thinks that might not continue.

Yes, if you really want to get angry, read the Hart Group chat logs about how much money has been put into co-ordinating the lobbying against any covid mitigation measures in schools.

How many MPs, journalists, scientists etc they have onside and how they use them and the media to influence government.

For it to work, there needs to be an ACTUAL plan for if, when they finally arrive having been contracted out to one of their buddies, the monitors show that some (many!) schools or parts of schools can’t actually be ventilated properly. On this thread and in responses to the DFE on social media you can see that schools who already have these in science labs find they’re constantly going off! Without an actual plan to improve ventilation, this is no more than the DFE’s usual solution to COVID; a useless piece of propaganda at best and a way to point the responsibility/blame to schools at worst.

@AuntLydiasNewHairdo

U4T dont want their children to be cold. The govt listens to them before the unions. No point in CO2 monitors if we're not allowed to open the windows in winter.

If only U4T put as much energy into fighting pupil premium cuts as they do fighting masks and bubbles. Anyone would think they just want things back to normal for their own little darlings rather than supporting the most disadvantaged children in society.

@noblegiraffe

So what would you rather I do as a parent?

Your list of things that you are doing is great, particularly lobbying other parents.

Loads of parents vote Conservative. The only way to effect real change is if the government thinks that might not continue.

I am going to get in touch with this person locally who was in an anti-usforthem group.

Maybe I need to see what, if anything, I can do locally to do something proper about it.

I can't give up hope, because if I did I would get so down that it would crush me. So I will have to carry on in my naive belief that campaigning makes a difference.

As a parent, I also want to know what I can do. If it’s only being part of a WhatsApp conversation arguing for kids to wear thermals to school (school allows them, it’s just that all year round shorts are trendy for Y5/6 boys), so the window can be open a bit more often without children getting too cold, then I’ll happily do that. I do think monitors and data might help with that sort of parent level discussion.

I’m old enough to remember when the government promised laptops to schools for remote learning.

This government seems to have too little and too late as a policy principle (not just on schools and covid). Is 300,000 enough?

There are roughly 20,000 state primary & secondary schools in England which would work out as about 15 each. That number will go down if you include nurseries, special schools and PRUs.

I don’t suppose the DfE have done anything as organised as asking how many each school will need to have one in every classroom.

As with the laptops, they've probably assumed that schools are already awash with C02 monitors and will only need a couple to top-up their copious supplies.

I guess this is something, a tiny step in the right direction. They really are spectacularly slow with so many things.

Next job: update the official covid symptoms list.

I don’t suppose the DfE have done anything as organised as asking how many each school will need to have one in every classroom
You won’t be getting one for every class room. The government guidance is quite clear that these monitors are ‘portable’ so you can move them around to test your ‘full estate ’……from the guidance…..
“CO2 monitors are portable so schools and other settings will be able to move them around to test their full estate, starting with areas they suspect may be poorly ventilated.”

I despair.
We have people complaining that their children are sitting in cold (well-ventilated) classrooms; (some)schools refusing to allow children to wear extra layers or jackets and scarfs in class: windows that won't open in substandard buildings, and the government response is to send out CO2 monitors??
How about legislation saying that all classrooms should have properly opening windows, enforcement procedures, and giving schools a budget to make it happen? It's not OK to be saying that windows are jammed shut/painted shut .. they need to be properly maintained so that they open.
I work in a school, btw, where we did manage to have windows and doors open all the time last winter, and we took the sensible approach and allowed children to wear whatever extra layers they needed to keep warm. It was cold, we had heaters on, but it was bearable, and the children and parents were happy because they could see we were doing everything possible to keep their children safe. It is not rocket science.
I agree we have the thickest ( if most expensively educated) government in Europe!

@AuntLydiasNewHairdo

U4T dont want their children to be cold. The govt listens to them before the unions. No point in CO2 monitors if we're not allowed to open the windows in winter.

This

The problem is that many parents will view this as the Government solving the problem of ventilation, and if teachers point out the flaws, they will just be seen as moaning and complaining.

It’s like the promised laptops. The parents saw the headlines, the teachers saw the reality. One local school requested 30 laptops, they got one! I think on average schools got about a third of the laptops they requested and they took months to arrive, so were next to useless.

Parents need to lobby their MPs re funding for schools. It was dire before COVID and the pandemic has just made it worse.

It’s like the promised laptops. The parents saw the headlines, the teachers saw the reality. One local school requested 30 laptops, they got one! I think on average schools got about a third of the laptops they requested and they took months to arrive, so were next to useless.

Exactly. Schools were the ones left to explain to parents that there weren't any laptops, which was great fun not

In more affluent areas, presumably not large numbers of laptops were needed, as this would have been very variable? But in those areas I wonder if parents might be bothered by there being little in schools to mitigate covid spread.

However many laptops there were(n't), most people were not directly affected.

You misunderstand, iam, the govt asked schools how many laptops they needed, then overruled them and provided them with far fewer, on the incorrect assumption that schools already had them in classrooms and were just lying.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-58285359

I notice the BBC are using a photo in the article that is possibly from a school in another country, as the children aren't in uniform, nicely spaced out and wearing masks.

@ineedaholidaynow

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-58285359

I notice the BBC are using a photo in the article that is possibly from a school in another country, as the children aren't in uniform, nicely spaced out and wearing masks.

And right next to it this article to help convince us that catching Covid is no big deal and indeed healthful and therapeutic

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-58270098

Only way for these to work is to keep windows and doors open as per last year. The school I work at already use some of these to monitor the ventilation.
Last winter it was so cold and miserable for staff and pupils.

@noblegiraffe

You misunderstand, iam, the govt asked schools how many laptops they needed, then overruled them and provided them with far fewer, on the incorrect assumption that schools already had them in classrooms and were just lying.

No, I do understand.

What I am saying is - in affluent areas schools did not need as many laptops as in non-affluent areas. Politically speaking, the lack of laptops was a newspaper story only, in Conservative-voting areas.

@justaweeone

Only way for these to work is to keep windows and doors open as per last year. The school I work at already use some of these to monitor the ventilation. Last winter it was so cold and miserable for staff and pupils.

Agreed.

It’s all very well parents and the DF saying lessons can be held outside and the children can just ‘build dens’ but my DC is doing A levels and months of sitting and listening/writing essays in a freezing cold classroom in a draft for 6 hours a day was totally grim-she was miserable and not learning effectively. It was better when she was home self isolating as at least she was warm. The head recommended gloves and reusable hand warmers which I get was trying to be helpful, but is really not a terribly easy situation to write in!

@ineedaholidaynow

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-58285359

I notice the BBC are using a photo in the article that is possibly from a school in another country, as the children aren't in uniform, nicely spaced out and wearing masks.

I don't think I've ever seen a photo that is more obviously not a UK classroom. And it's not even just the masks and the distancing and covid stuff.

my DC is doing A levels and months of sitting and listening/writing essays in a freezing cold classroom in a draft for 6 hours a day was totally grim I honestly, honestly don't identify with this, my child deliberately sat by the open window the whole time and was fine (also A-levels).

I honestly, honestly don't identify with this, my child deliberately sat by the open window the whole time and was fine (also A-levels)

Which is because I’m guessing he’s picked up on your worries about classrooms? Or because you’ve told him how dangerous it is to sit in classrooms?

If he’s purposefully going for the open window (was he pushing other students out the way to do this?) then he must have some level of heightened anxiety that the other children don’t have?

I agree with others in that there’s little point in having the monitors if there is no solution.

So it beeps….then what?
Realistically what can the teacher actually do?

I imagine a classroom full of primary school age children may not be as willing to sit in cold classrooms as A Level age students are.

And I also imagine a monitor that keeps going off is probably quite disruptive to a lesson.

As another poster said - the monitor is only telling teachers and the public what they already know.

The Givernment need to do something to improve ventilation in classroom, not hand out monitors that won’t actually solve anything.

You’re doing a great job with your campaigning though OP, keep fighting because like you said, nothing will change otherwise

@lannistunut I agree with your posts.

The message that ventilation is an effective way of managing Covid is understood by some, but not all - there is even variation in attitudes to improving ventilation among school staff. The government are not good at clear messaging, and the importance of ventilation re. Covid has not been clearly communicated to the public.

This would be a small, but meaningful, first step in focusing on the ventilation issue. It would be easier to address the problem of poor ventilation from an evidence base.

I, personally, would find it easier to persuade Year 10 (and their parents) to let me open the windows and door if I had a machine that visibly showed me and them that ventilation in the classroom needed improving. If it then showed that ventilation had improved after opening the window then that would be useful, too.