Are schools allowed to shut down classes / year groups if lots have Covid?

[Tuliprain]

My child’s year group are going down like flies at the moment. Just wondered if there is a point when the school is able to close for that class or year group? Or will they just have to keep going?

So you’re happy with the current set up?

No isolation for close contacts

I can’t tell from your post
Not whilst cases have been rising and they seem to go hand in hand with almost no mitigation measures in schools. The government stopped making decisions based on what assorted medical and scientific experts said months ago.

The government haven't given a damn about children's education throughout this crisis and they still don't care. Their main priority is cramming as many children into schools with as few measures as possible, and then sending millions to Ofsted to ramp up inspections.

Lola there are associated harms from isolation or school closures for dc, the CMO has been clear on this - thank god someone has. He advises based on this so it’s not correct to say that his views haven’t impacted where we are, and obviously he is a key scientific adviser.

Children are very low risk from the virus but adversely affected by closure. I see it as the same ethical issue that arose when deciding on vaccine for the group.

The benefit of closure / isolation was not for children which Chris Whitty recognised. I’m relieved we had him in our corner otherwise you could see a situation like Chicago where schools were shut for 18 months for state only.

I agree that it is an ethical issue. I think we have failed children quite spectacularly during this pandemic.

Lola there are associated harms from isolation or school closures for dc, the CMO has been clear on this - thank god someone has. He advises based on this so it’s not correct to say that his views haven’t impacted where we are, and obviously he is a key scientific adviser.

Children are very low risk from the virus but adversely affected by closure. I see it as the same ethical issue that arose when deciding on vaccine for the group.

The benefit of closure / isolation was not for children which Chris Whitty recognised. I’m relieved we had him in our corner otherwise you could see a situation like Chicago where schools were shut for 18 months for state only.
I've not said there's no negatives from partial school closures. I've explicitly said I'd rather have all my students in front of me than the dribs and drabs we've had this year.

My issue is that there's a lot of people who throughout this crisis have taken the approach of 'business as normal' in schools from day one, who were obstructive and unpleasant about putting appropriate measures in at the beginning, have been anti-appropriate health and safety measures throughout and are still complaining that schools aren't running as they were pre-covid.

If people are serious about having a school system that is open and effective then there needs to be a push on appropriate measures and appropriate planning on a strategic level.

It will change. High cases will pass

We are back to normal now - in London too, so busy

We had a letter from school recently saying if there were 5 kids in one class off at one time or 10% of the school population overall, we would move into “contingency measures” though not sure what that constitutes.

It’s a primary school so I assume closures and reversion to home learning for affected classes, rather than masks or distancing, but not sure really.

Bubbles are usually the first thing to come back into Primaries, no whole school assemblies and restricting visitors, if cases start rising. Bubbles, however, rely on full staff being in, so can cause problems if staff start getting ill. Then conversely you have to start mixing classes to ensure they have an adult in the room!

'My issue is that there's a lot of people who throughout this crisis have taken the approach of 'business as normal' in schools from day one, who were obstructive and unpleasant about putting appropriate measures in at the beginning, have been anti-appropriate health and safety measures throughout and are still complaining that schools aren't running as they were pre-covid.

If people are serious about having a school system that is open and effective then there needs to be a push on appropriate measures and appropriate planning on a strategic level.'

Well said.

@LolaSmiles

No, ‘appropriate measures’ are not what we need. What we need is schools open normally and DC in school.

A lot of ‘appropriate measures’ that the unions and ‘independent’ sage have asked for like bubbles and social distancing would actually result in schools being closed to millions of healthy DC.

DH’s number 1 priority is keeping all his students in school. Even all they do is chat to friends, they are far better doing that than stuck at home in their bedrooms.

That is why he is very clear that unless and until a student tests positive or develops symptoms, they must be in school. Even DC with positive siblings at home have rightly been in class interacting with staff and students at DH’s school.

DH believes that the school experience should be as close to normal as possible, which is why things like masks are not permitted.

[quote GreenLakes]@LolaSmiles

No, ‘appropriate measures’ are not what we need. What we need is schools open normally and DC in school.

A lot of ‘appropriate measures’ that the unions and ‘independent’ sage have asked for like bubbles and social distancing would actually result in schools being closed to millions of healthy DC.

DH’s number 1 priority is keeping all his students in school. Even all they do is chat to friends, they are far better doing that than stuck at home in their bedrooms.

That is why he is very clear that unless and until a student tests positive or develops symptoms, they must be in school. Even DC with positive siblings at home have rightly been in class interacting with staff and students at DH’s school.

DH believes that the school experience should be as close to normal as possible, which is why things like masks are not permitted.[/quote]
Schools aren't open normally. They are working on skeleton staff who are on their knees.

@Sherrystrull

There are currently no staff absent through covid at DH’s school.

The vast majority of staff are vaccinated and have already had covid.

My DD's class has only had 12 out of 30 children in for the last week - we had to PCR all children after they started dropping like flies and then daily LFT until next week for those still left, but class still open.
School have been amazing and handled it so well.

Good for them. Sadly that's not the case in my school. DH's school and the school my children go to.

My school continues to be massively disrupted by staff absence.

I think we have to be very clear about what we mean (and want) by a school or class being 'open'.

If we mean 'able to keep children within the building, fairly safely - in terms of not doing anything too actively dangerous and with some kind of adult having oversight', that is one thing. Most schools have been managing this most of the time in almost all classes since September, and this means that parents and carers have been able to go to work more consistently and that those children who do not have Covid at any particular time are at least having adequate social stimulation (and for those at risk of harm in the home, are out of that environment for a minimum number of hours each day).

If by open we mean 'consistently delivering the normal standard of education through the normal number of fully-trained teaching staff and with the normal levels of support for those children with additional needs', then that is something very different. Relatively few schools have managed this every day for every child since September - though this is very hard to establish 'from the outside' as parents, let alone the wider public, are quite simply denied the information that they would need to be able to judge this. My school has been extremely lightly hit in comparison with many, but we have been down to the point of having every single 18+ in the school (from lunchtime supervisors and part-time cleaners up) standing in front of a class, with no-one left in the office and with no 1:1s except for manual handling of a physically disabled child.... This is not 'education as normal', or 'schools open as normal'. It is 'the school building open to just about safely babysit between the hours of 8.30 and 3.30', but no more.

@GreenLakes

DH believes that the school experience should be as close to normal as possible, which is why things like masks are not permitted.

I really hope your DH hasn’t stopped those that want to wear masks from doing so

Our whole school went online for a day last week and wouldn’t surprise me if it becomes a more regular thing

@OnceuponaRainbow18

Our whole school went online for a day last week and wouldn’t surprise me if it becomes a more regular thing

What prompted doing it for one day?

@cantkeepawayforever

I think we have to be very clear about what we mean (and want) by a school or class being 'open'.

If we mean 'able to keep children within the building, fairly safely - in terms of not doing anything too actively dangerous and with some kind of adult having oversight', that is one thing. Most schools have been managing this most of the time in almost all classes since September, and this means that parents and carers have been able to go to work more consistently and that those children who do not have Covid at any particular time are at least having adequate social stimulation (and for those at risk of harm in the home, are out of that environment for a minimum number of hours each day).

If by open we mean 'consistently delivering the normal standard of education through the normal number of fully-trained teaching staff and with the normal levels of support for those children with additional needs', then that is something very different. Relatively few schools have managed this every day for every child since September - though this is very hard to establish 'from the outside' as parents, let alone the wider public, are quite simply denied the information that they would need to be able to judge this. My school has been extremely lightly hit in comparison with many, but we have been down to the point of having every single 18+ in the school (from lunchtime supervisors and part-time cleaners up) standing in front of a class, with no-one left in the office and with no 1:1s except for manual handling of a physically disabled child.... This is not 'education as normal', or 'schools open as normal'. It is 'the school building open to just about safely babysit between the hours of 8.30 and 3.30', but no more.

Absolutely agree completely with this. You've described my school to a tee.

@MarshaBradyo

They sold it as a test run to see if everyone could access teams from home…

Ds was in a class where there were only 17 out of 30 kids but school remained open

@cantkeepawayforever

I think we have to be very clear about what we mean (and want) by a school or class being 'open'.

If we mean 'able to keep children within the building, fairly safely - in terms of not doing anything too actively dangerous and with some kind of adult having oversight', that is one thing. Most schools have been managing this most of the time in almost all classes since September, and this means that parents and carers have been able to go to work more consistently and that those children who do not have Covid at any particular time are at least having adequate social stimulation (and for those at risk of harm in the home, are out of that environment for a minimum number of hours each day).

If by open we mean 'consistently delivering the normal standard of education through the normal number of fully-trained teaching staff and with the normal levels of support for those children with additional needs', then that is something very different. Relatively few schools have managed this every day for every child since September - though this is very hard to establish 'from the outside' as parents, let alone the wider public, are quite simply denied the information that they would need to be able to judge this. My school has been extremely lightly hit in comparison with many, but we have been down to the point of having every single 18+ in the school (from lunchtime supervisors and part-time cleaners up) standing in front of a class, with no-one left in the office and with no 1:1s except for manual handling of a physically disabled child.... This is not 'education as normal', or 'schools open as normal'. It is 'the school building open to just about safely babysit between the hours of 8.30 and 3.30', but no more.

Absolutely.

So when Ofsted are given an extra £24m to ensure that more schools can be inspected quicker (with priorities such as curriculum progression and Deep Dives into geography), it is rather a slap in the face!

[quote OnceuponaRainbow18]@MarshaBradyo

They sold it as a test run to see if everyone could access teams from home…[/quote]
Oh right fingers crossed it was a one off.

I can’t see the point in doing the odd day regularly just for the sake of it. Plus it shouldn’t be possible imo

Green I like the sound of your dh’s approach.

Having no staff off with covid isn't an 'approach' it's pure luck.

The decision on closure isn't based only on numbers, but on where spread is happening.

We have had classes with high numbers out BUT all from households with older siblings caught up in the 2000+ / 100,000 case rate in teens locally. As the evidence suggested that the transmission wasn't in our setting, the class stayed open despite the numbers, on the face of it, easily justifying closure. Of course, neither those in school or at home got anything much more than babysitting because of staff absence and the difficulty of delivering effective home learning and in-school learning simultaneously, but the class was 'open for safe babysitting'

@Sherrystrull

Having no staff off with covid isn't an 'approach' it's pure luck.

Yes it is she outlined his views on various things.