If workplaces are planning on a 25% absence rate then how on earth are we all expecting schools to carry on as normal ?

[Timetobuckup]

I have just been reading in the BBC website that the gov are telling businesses to plan for a quarter of their workforce to be absent .
There is no way schools / colleges will manage with that amount of staff out.

I work in a secondary school and had a pcr this morning , my teen ds is positive and I am keeping fingers and toes crossed I am negative but not holding out much hope.
We are doing mass testing on Tues and I am really interested to see how many have to go home.

I think the one think Omicron might be good for is keeping OFSTED at bay for a wee while

Has that been said anywhere? I know they are delaying restarting inspections until next Monday, but that’s about it. They have also said that serving school leaders won’t be called out of schools to do inspections before 26th January, but that still means they will be going ahead next week, and if you are due to be inspected, the stress will still be on.

@NinaDefoe

Yes Golden but which jobs were they? And what were they reassigned to?

Let me guess... office/ phone based jobs.
Sorting out food parcels, advice lines?

Well, to give you the example of one person I know (not me): was reassigned in March 2020 from a desk job involving procurement to one that involved reporting on where mass grave sites would be. Total doddle, eh?

@Appuskidu Sadly it hasn't but I am making a (hopeful) assumption as they tend to stay clear if the rates rise.

@GoldenOmber that's a really important job - but it's the same skill set- project management and organisation. That same person might completely fall apart faced with 20 children ...

@visitingagain 20 children ? I need someone to stand in front of over 100 tomorrow aged 11-16. Any takers ? Or should I just let them 'lead their own learning' ?

No Golden I'm not disputing it happened but we were in a very different situation and reassigning your (probably not DBS checked) colleague to that grim task is different to sending them into a classroom. Not all council workers are DBS checked. Not all council workers can drop their front line job. It's a noble idea but the people you'd generate would be a drop in the ocean.

[quote visitingagain]@GoldenOmber that's a really important job - but it's the same skill set- project management and organisation. That same person might completely fall apart faced with 20 children ...[/quote]
It wasn’t really the same skill set, no. (And the idea that somebody might fall apart when faced with 20 kids but this wouldn’t happen with work involving mass graves is a bit odd, tbh, but anyway.)

But: once again, and for what has to be about the fifth? sixth? time now: I am not saying that any random adult could do a teachers’ or TA’s job. I am saying that IF schools risk closure due to just not having enough adults around to safely supervise, THEN send in adults who are already Disclosure-checked, who can’t teach but who can at least be better than leaving the kids in a room on their own.

No it would not fix everything; but surely anything safe is better than “fuck it, close all the schools”?

Not all council workers are DBS checked. Not all council workers can drop their front line job.

No. But SOME are. And those of us who are, could, as we did once already.

Obviously I would rather have adequately-staffed schools filled with professional staff, teaching and supporting children. But IF we are in a scenario where ‘school’ is ‘Mel the dinner lady is supervising 60 kids in the hall on her own and oh dear, Mel’s started coughing’, then surely better to do what we can to keep schools at least open with at least adequately-checked adults in the room, rather than close them for everyone? No?

With case number so high I think it’s a given that children will be off sick for a few weeks, then parents will have to be at home with their children.

@BluebellsGreenbells or parents will just send them in sick. As happened last term. I lost count of the number who told me, while coughing and sneezing, that they were waiting for their PCR result. Usually the same ones who can't wear a mask properly. I'm tired

At secondary level, being at home working online is going to be better for most than being in a hall with random-non-teacher mucking about. Senior students in particular really need to be working on their coursework in somewhere more quiet.
So if it reaches the point of 60 pupils in a hall with a dinner lady, then I think they should be sent home.

The idea that anyone with a DBS check could supervise a class of children is ridiculous.
My DH has a DBS check as he does volunteer reading at our DCs school once a week. He works 1:1 with children, they are very well behaved with him, it certainly gave him a sense that teaching is only a positive experience.
At DS2s last birthday party I left DH alone with a group of 10 boys for 5 minutes. I came back to carnage, they were all running amok. Took me all of 15 secs to return them to a level of sanity. DH was genuinely in awe - doesn't happen often!
I'm not saying every adult who is not a teacher couldn't cope, but plenty would struggle.

@GoldenOmber some parents will happily sue a school if a child is hurt due to inadequate supervision. Ofsted will shut a school down if safeguarding measures are not 'by the book'. Most parents will complain to the school if toilets aren't cleaned or pastoral complaints aren't dealt with quickly enough. Covid won't be taken as an excuse.

Go ahead Golden but as I say, I think it will be a handful of you doing it. Personally I'd rather you didn't. If things are so bad that we're relying on any warm body to keep a school open for childcare purposes then I'd rather the government admitted it was no longer education and allow parents some choice.

A dbs check isnt the entirety of safeguarding either. All school staff have safeguarding training at a general level and then how it applies in their context. So i dont feel having children in school equals children being safeguarded from risk either if it becomes any adult with dbs. Which is the most compelling reason for schools being open any all costs.

@angstridden2

I expect I’ll get shot down , but it would be good to see a few more teachers on here being constructive and offering suggestions on how schools could get through this hopefully short term crisis. Classes can’t be blended, non fully qualified staff can’t help out, online teaching won’t work because covid + teachers won’t continue working although most of the young people I know who have had covid have continued working from home. It’s so relentlessly negative. What exactly do they suggest? Send all children home again to the detriment of their education and keep primary school parents away from their own jobs...nurses, doctors etc.

I know it’s been hard, I know it can be a rubbish job; been there, got the t shirt but really what do people suggest happens?

I'd like the government to do their job to protect the country from threats, and prioritise children and education by taking action to prevent and mitigate these crises.

Education has been lurching from covid crisis to covid crisis for 18 months.

It needs long term planning, and the country needs a coherent covid strategy.

We've known covid us airborne for years.

Masks and air filtration work no matter which variant you're dealing with.

This isn't a sudden shock crisis that no one could have foreseen and no one could have prevented.

And it won't be next winter either.

But if the dinner lady is supervising kids, who is preparing lunch or going to supervise them at lunch time?

I was just reading how early years ratios can be temporarily ignored but that it is still the school's responsibility to keep those children safe.
That just sums it up really. The government tells school ' you should do this, you must not do that' but when it goes tits up they can say ' well it was only guidance.'
That's wrong and very unfair.

@angstridden2 lovely to get your input. I've been in school twice this past week and am in again today. In an attempt to solve the issues that are now happening. Which we told government would happen 6 months ago. I have no idea how many staff or students I can expect tomorrow, but know I'm down 27 adults already. We are also testing everyone in tutor so that will cause chaos, like last time, as some will test positive. Having got the bus in and mingled with their friends before school. Yeah.
So we are having to come up with solutions, even if they are shit. It's a shame the DfE couldn't do their job and help. As long as no one expects an education then it will be fine.

We are also testing everyone in tutor so that will cause chaos, like last time, as some will test positive. Having got the bus in and mingled with their friends before school

Yes, but my DC's school actually had this planned before the government decreed it yesterday. They would rather have a mass transmission event in the school hall/gym than take the word of parents.

As regards, Mel the dinner lady supervising 60 kids. I agree that home learning would better for exam year pupils than this.
If exam year pupils could be taught by a subject-specialist teacher online (even if it is not their normal teacher - 120 pupils could join in online easier than 30 in individual real-life classes) that would be better than being in school but getting no specialist subject teaching.

After all, the government haven't changed their plan to make this years's exams harder, grading lower and university acceptances lower so that this year's y11 and y13 can be sacrificed for the 2 preceding yeargroups.

I expect I’ll get shot down , but it would be good to see a few more teachers on here being constructive and offering suggestions on how schools could get through this hopefully short term crisis. Classes can’t be blended, non fully qualified staff can’t help out, online teaching won’t work because covid + teachers won’t continue working although most of the young people I know who have had covid have continued working from home. It’s so relentlessly negative. What exactly do they suggest? Send all children home again to the detriment of their education and keep primary school parents away from their own jobs...nurses, doctors etc.

Especially as this omicron wave will hopefully plateau soon and then decline rapidly.

What about the next wave though?

Almost like running a school on a tiny budget is really quick tricky at the best of times!

8 years of missed recruitment targets, this isn’t an unforeseen problem.

In other countries money has been spent on air purifiers and improved ventilation, thousands per child made available for a recovery curriculum, lower class sizes are the norm. My daughter has one class where there aren’t enough desks and someone has to sit on a window sill, obviously now under an open window. Just like the nhs if you run things at maximum capacity in normal times you risk them breaking in a crisis.

There is no quick fix, lots of schools will be forced to partial closures.

What an excellent plan send in randoms to work with our kids. What the fuck could possibly go wrong. Given all the oooh schools must be open for the kids mental health etc how does that help the kids that need the adults they trust and are used to. We needed the govt to step up and actually DO something. Spend money on safer air systems. Surely all of you can see that is impt. Really hoping this is the beginning of the end of the pandemic because I just can't cope with this teacher bashing bollocks anymore.

@PastMyBestBeforeDate

Go ahead Golden but as I say, I think it will be a handful of you doing it. Personally I'd rather you didn't. If things are so bad that we're relying on any warm body to keep a school open for childcare purposes then I'd rather the government admitted it was no longer education and allow parents some choice.

I agree, at this point parents should certainly be given a choice and even encouraged to keep children at home where possible, this isn’t school, this is babysitting. I mean no disrespect to those helping out but that’s not the best environment for every child.

What about the next wave though?

Perhaps I'm too optimistic, but I'm hoping that the milder omicron variant together with increased vaccine and natural immunity may shift this pandemic towards a milder virus that becomes endemic