UK schools could, and should, begin to reopen as soon as practicable after the initial wave of cases has passed through

[Otherrooms]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52180783

What do you make of this?

Schools could go back even whilst social distancing rules are still in place?

Have these people ever been in a school? School corridors/classrooms anyone?!

How will that work with parents who are at higher risk ? I am in my fifties and have auto immune disease,( common and well managed). Dc1 also has auto immune disease. I am at increased risk, but not at the level of needing shielding. She is at slightly increased risk, but her age should mitigate that. (Both dc are under 16) We had taken them out of school already, so it was a huge relief when the school closed . I don’t know what on earth we would do if it re-opened while case levels were still high.

I'm a teacher. I don't think we'll be off until September but I agree that there will be no socially distancing nice schools are back I am in on a rota at the moment with primary-aged children. There are only an average of 12 in a group but with the younger ones especially it is nigh-on impossible to ensure social distancing.

My usual class has 30 6-year olds in a relatively small space. There would be no way to keep 2m between pupils.

We have one single entrance to the school so parents will all meet there at pick up and drop-off. A staggered drop-off and pickup could help but staggered openings and timings would be a nightmare for me and DH (both teachers) to manage with our own primary-aged DC who attend a different school.

As I said, I think we will be back, probably for June, but it will create an increase in spread of the virus then. I expect social distancing will come back in full force over the summer holidays when schools would be closed anyway.

Even if HSE declares it's not safe for certain people to be in work, they won't decree that they have to be paid to stay away. Having a health condition that makes it impossible for you to work, would be grounds for dismissal for ill health capability under usual circumstances.

People will need to make their own decisions based on the government advice and their personal situation but it simply isn't feasible for the "flu jab" group to be paid to stay at home indefinitely. There are 25m of them!

At some point the vulnerable will have to be advised to go back to work. As with all the current precautions, they are not there to protect individuals, they are there to protect the NHS. Once the peak has passed, the NHS will need less protection.

I do think in schools there will be a lot of people off sick with MH issued caused by the stress of working with underlying conditions though.

Denmark schools and nurseries are due to return after their Easter holidays. It will be interesting to see what effect this has on their COVID numbers. Countries like this could perhaps influence the decision here.
I worry about the impact school closures have on vulnerable children.

This is about economy over the virus again. They just want people back to work now. If they haven't mentioned cluster testing areas before this and, as pp said this is effectively ending social distancing, then letting asymptomatic super spreaders become vectors again is highly irresponsible. Without testing being rolled out at a local level this will only reinstate pockets of the virus. There is no way dd's school can constantly clean all rails, tables, chairs they cough on/sneeze on or touch - the week before the schools were closed our canteen ran out of spoons and the kids ate cake pudding with their hands!

Denmark has much better testing and contact tracing than us. You cannot do this without ramping up testing hugely.

It would only be grounds for dismissal if every other option had proved to be unmanageable.

So firstly they should be offered another job elsewhere in the organisation.

Think the unions would go mad if good teachers were dismissed on health grounds. Can’t see it happening tbh

I do think in schools there will be a lot of people off sick with MH issued caused by the stress of working with underlying conditions though.

And if they try to open schools without those people with underlying health conditions, I would imagine the impact on those left in the schools (judging by the few days before schools were actually closed and we were running on a skeleton staff) and their mental health will be significant as wel.

Of course mass dismissals won't actually happen but equally teachers can't stay at home on full pay indefinitely, so the guidelines will have to change and the unions will have to (eventually) support that. Initially the unions were very dictatorial about keeping to schools open but they did realise quite quickly that it's in their member's interests to be indispensable .

*about keeping schools open for the vulnerable etc

@Appuskidu some of the biggest may have up to 30. It’s usually based on the size of classrooms which are often quite small, especially in older schools but if they are a big newer school with big classrooms they would be able to have 30. Again, they wouldn’t be allowed to have more than half the class in a room so a room for 20 could only have 10 and a room for 30 could only have 15. In reality, not everyone is coming in so we have fewer anyway. In my class everyone is coming in but a colleague only has four. It’s interesting how children started to come back as time went on. Week 1 I had quite a few off (although a couple were quarantining having returned from abroad) but by week 3 they were all in.

Lessons are definitely not completely normal but we are covering the core curriculum. It is true that specialist subjects are taught more sporadically and as it remains online at secondary level, practical tasks have to be completed at home which is fine for things like Food Tech but more challenging for woodwork and some aspects of art. As you are, we are doing what we can to make the best of a difficult situation.

I’m in the initial vulnerable group who were told to stay home if possible- I stayed at work till we closed but haven’t gone in since as there have been enough staff to cover the very small number of children.
Once the initial wave is over I’m very happy to go back- I accept most of us will get it but would rather not get it while the NHS is at peak because I’m more likely to get it badly.
I really hope we go back after half term. Hopefully the main peak of the first wave will be done. We can’t live like this for ever. I miss the kids so much and so many of them need that structure.

I'd be happy to go back after the Easter holidays, but agree with PP that once we re-open schools social distancing is over.

You can't say to two households that their children can mix closely all day, but then it's not acceptable for the adults to take those same children to the park together after school, meet up for dinner or go to the pub together in the evening.

The whole lot will have to go at once.

If it is to be May it will be quite a shock to the system to some staff and students who have settled into the idea that it will be Sept.

To be fair, myself, my colleagues and other teacher friends are desperate to go back to school before September and have some normality back.
There does need to be proper safety measures implemented and resourced though. I’m not looking forward to going back to red and peeling hands from hourly cleaning of my germ factory classroom of 30 keyboards, mouses and screens with cleaning supplies provided by me, from before!

UK has just begun what will (hopefully) be its peak week followed by a slow gradual decline over a matter of perhaps a month and some people are clamoring to end the lockdown right now. You guys are nuts!

This whole thing of trying to make the inconvenient virus fit around the school timetable is nuts. Reopen when the virus no longer poses a significant threat to large sections of society and not before.

There are lots of children out of school for medical reasond ordinarily. The LA either arranges remote or home tutoring

You clearly don't know how difficult this is to arrange. If a child is shielding and therefore can't go to school, then they also can't have a homer tutor!

I don't understand your post cam

Parents cracking already.

I think it's the worst idea I've heard in a long time. Those of us who have kids generally agree that they bring home most of the bugs and viruses in the household and that schools are prime breeding grounds for disease. Children have no concept of social distancing and it would be impossible in a classroom setting. It's far too early in lockdown for scientists to have any indication of how school closures have impacted the spread. I would be very interested to find out who is funding this 'study' tbh.

DfE advice for social distancing in schools:

The new DfE guidance also states that, as much as possible, children, young people and staff “should be spaced apart at all times”.

This means:

sitting children at desks that are far apart
ensuring everyone queues and eats further apart than normal
keeping apart when in the playground or doing any physical exercise
visiting the toilet one after the other
staggering break times
putting guidelines on the floor in corridors
avoiding unnecessary staff gatherings

So would l Ruffle!

Good grief noble.

I think the danger of reopening schools is that we will just see this same scenario happening again. What happens when numbers of cases rise and risk overwhelming the NHS again? We shut down everything for another 12 weeks? I agree with a poster above, we need widespread testing and then extensive contact tracing and quarantine in place before they can start getting back to normal.

Even before the schools were shut down, my DD’s school told her year not to come in because of the severe shortage of staff (who were ill/self isolating). I think there would just be months and months of that if they told schools to carry on.

Let the BBC take over lessons for a few months till this is all over!