If you don't think schools should reopen now, why do you think things will be better in September?

[IntolerableCruelty]

I'm school leadership and as you can imagine, my colleagues and I have been talking round in circles over this for the last few days.

We're completely conflicted, we want to be able to educate and safeguard students properly again but we also want to care for staff properly. We know we have a number of very anxious and/or vulnerable staff who will find it very difficult return regardless of what the "requirements" are.

So far, we have only managed to get to a point where we can "re-open" for very small numbers of children, not really offering much different to we're doing currently. ("Re-open" because we never actually closed)

However, we also can't see that we'll be able to do anything differently if it's all postponed until September.

Or maybe people who are resisting it think we should never go back? Obviously not, but we have intelligent (honest!) people working on this and haven't yet managed to find a way.

I think we shouldn't go back now, open up in summer (when the risk of infection is lower and the consequences of the NHS overload are less) and close again in September if it's climbing.

I don't expect any teachers to think this is a good idea for obvious reasons.

Why is the risk of infection lower in Summer?

The evidence seems to be that children are far less susceptible to covid 19 than adults so the key question is how does any school manage to keep their staff safe.
There are some real difficulties logistically to re-starting schools and so the idea that nursery, reception, year 1 and year 6 are all going to start on 1st June is wishful thinking, the best that can be hoped for is to start small and work upwards.
One of the largest concerns for us is that to keep the class numbers to 15, we are effectively going to be using all the classrooms for less than half the pupils in the school. That is why we are planning towards a re-start which is slow and part-time, in the hope that we can move to having most of the year groups back in school part-time by the start of the summer break. But that is us being optimistic and anything could happen in the next 2 and 1/2 months.

I think the virus has "go away" in its calendar to do list for September the 1st apparently.

Nurses and Dr's are far more likely to catch it and they don't protest at having to go to work. Schools cannot stay closed much longer. It's preventing parents going back to work. Everything needs to be done as safely as possible for students and teachers.

Why is the risk of infection lower in Summer?

If it's anything like flu there is likely to be a season. It's an envelope virus and they tend to like the cold. Plus being inside with heating is great for viruses. Lack of vitamin D is a nasty respiratory problem and sunlight kills a lot of viruses.

Because the longer it is delayed the more research there will be into treatment, we might actually have a decent testing & tracking system in place, antibody testing might be underway.

By September there may be more effective treatments. Clinicians are looking at plasma Antibody treatment alongside anti virals to lessen the severity of the virus. This could be available to all in a similar way to tamiflu was for swine flu. Treatments will come sooner than a vaccine ... but they won’t be available by June 1st.

One would have hoped that by September a larger percentage rate of the population would be immune (in theory at least) and we might actually have a rough idea of what that figure is.

If antibody testing is rolled out in full by September, and if we’re prepared to trust that it indicates at least temporary immunity, then you could do some form of schooling taught/supervised by teachers with proven antibodies, and young, healthy non-pregnant, teachers, (you could make a case for only picking white women, but something tells me that wouldn’t fly). It’s still a risk though, because it can be a nasty old disease to catch even if you’re young and healthy enough to fight it off at home.

Children who are medically vulnerable or living with shielded relatives might need to be enrolled in proper full time online education staffed by teachers who can’t safely work in classrooms, or possibly enrolled in very small shielded and socially distanced class groups with (at least) weekly testing for all staff and pupils.

Nothing will be different before 2021.

More testing, more data.
Track and trace up and running now would help.

We might have test track and trace running properly by September, and that should make a major difference

There may also be more information on promising treatments, possibly even a breakthrough

One would have hoped that by September a larger percentage rate of the population would be immune
How do all these people become immune though? There has to be some interaction for people to catch the virus to become immune to it.

FWIW, I’m not completely against reopening schools now, but I do think it’s going to pose many difficulties for SLT and teaching staff in general. I don’t think September is going to bring any massive changes to anything, it’s just a few more months in the future. The virus will still be here, it won’t have gone anywhere.

They would be more time to plan. Implement any changes needed. Plan appropriate home learning material to support a part time timetable. Work out staffing. Feels like it's been sprung on schools without adequate time to fully prepare.

Because by September we should have test trace isolate in place so we can stop clusters of infection. Currently noone know where the clusters are and who is spreading - it's all reactive, whereas when we have contact tracing in place it can be proactive.

I agree with you that not much is likely to have changed by September. That's why I support the schools reopening in June - we can't keep the kids off school forever, and at least if it's a phased return for some year groups we get a 'dry run' to see how it could work for larger numbers next term.

I am happy to take the chance and go back. However as teachers cant work in masks and students won't socially distance, (teenagers think they are invincible and primary won't understand) the health risks are high as I can understand why many are reluctant.

I don't know why people are so rude about this. People keep answering the question and it just falls on deaf ears. Why not have a look around on every other thread with this title and or is it that you simply take satisfaction from the snotty delivery?

I've been wondering this myself and in fact I was talking to a colleague about it earlier. I think it's very unlikely anything will be different by September but if some year groups go back to school before the end of the summer term surely it gives schools the opportunity to try working differently for a few weeks and review it?

I've got a three teens and I would like to see yr10 DD go back in June - perhaps part-time - I'm concerned if it continues she won't be able to pass her GCSEs.

Nurses and Dr's are far more likely to catch it and they don't protest at having to go to work.

Little know fact on MN, but doctors who consider themselves vulnerable are working from home too. More than half of the consultants in one department I know.

I’m presuming that these consultants are working from home because they have completed a proper risk assessment and have been considered high risk.

I think the assumption is that by September the numbers of infected would have reduced (!) from their current 0000s a day and/or the government would finally have an up to speed contact tracing programme so that every incidence of infection was being tracked and isolated, contacts traced and quarantined, thereby reducing the risk hugely of further spread, so the numbers remain much in society, until we have a vaccine or better therapeutic treatment in place.
Otherwise whilst we still don’t know on a given day who does and doesn’t have it, every environment where there is sustained close contact with others such as school, is an unknown and potentially significant infection risk.

I am a teacher and also according to my doctors think I have had the virus. I caught it just before lockdown. I think that we should start returning but start with the older years and work our way down so yr 6 and 5 first the 4,3,2 ,1,R. My reason are with the older ones we can talk and explain to them. For example having a different teacher , the way lunch and breaks will be staggered the social distancing rules etc. Once we have got these years established and we know how some of it works. Slowly introduce a year at a time and this allows time to evaluate what is happening and make changes in routines etc. By the time the little ones come back the routines are established in the school and they will slip in just as they do when they start reception. Also this means if there is a second peak ( more than likely) and we have to lock down again their routine are not so disrupted. Also we will know more about the virus hopefully, the transmission in children and schools will have more time to work out what to do about social distancing with the smaller children. Lets face it 4,5 and 6 year olds are not going to socially distance. I am worried more about the mental health of these little ones who are going find it difficult to separate from parents and if they are upset according to the guidance we can not comfort them as we would normally would and school is going to be a very different place to the one they left possibly with an unknown teacher in a different room. The older ones we can talk to and explain. They will also have a better idea of what has been happening in the world. As I said before I am not against going back just the wrong years, limited government guidance and the lack of PPE and time to get organised. If the government listened to our concerns most teachers would willingly walk back into the classroom and at this moment missing their classes but what we want is safety and what is best for children first and then us and our families. Personally my children were in yr 1 and reception I would not be sending them back on 1st June not because I am afraid of the virus but of my concerns regarding safety and their mental well being.

I don’t understand a previous posters comment that it has been sprung on schools - surely the leadership of schools have been thinking about this the whole time they have been shut? I know the school my dc attend has been thinking about it from before the schools closed - it’s why they stopped all matches and events with other schools and large gatherings like assemblies and concerts about 3 weeks before the closure. They may have decided that it isn’t safe to come back on 1st June (don’t have a child in that year group so haven’t heard anything) or they may have a proposal they are discussing with staff but I doubt they think it was sprung on them.