The Ninth Republic - stand by for the return of Year 10

[StaffAssociationRepresentative]

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. It is meant for school staff. Baiters and bashers can jog on somewhere else.

If you are NOT staff and just have a general education query please start your own thread.

You can play here only if you are a member of one the following groups-

-ABBA - anti bashers and baiting association
-SWAB - school workers against bashers
-SWOT - school workers opposing teacherbashers
-STARS - schoolworkers together against ranting + slurs

Other requirements for staff room entry include the ability to find the staff room, the ability to find a clean mug in the staff room, knowledge of the photocopier codes, and the ability to sniff out where the toffee vodka is hidden.

If you are fed up with cakes and biscuits there is now a cheeseboard on offer

If you come with a stick to beat us with then please do so elsewhere and not in the staffroom.

Oh Gawd, Apuss, Mrs Naive here didn't even think of that!

If I were slt I'd demand to see proof

Its things like this that posters don't think about, when they say that schools should just be open and parents will take responsibility for temperature checking etc. in the morning.

We have had so many pupils that have arrived to school in no fit state to be there it is ridiculous.

Eg they have to prove they have a dental appointment.

How funny the tables have reversed!

Extract from that times article
Ministers are drawing up plans to offer summer camps for schoolchildren so working parents can have a break, but the big academic “catch-up” will not begin until September.
Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, is due to announce the plans for summer next week, alongside the thinking on how all schools can reopen in September. That is when the “catch up” promised by Boris Johnson is actually likely to begin with a national tutoring programme put in place for the most disadvantaged children.

That’s really interesting. We had a few years where we spent almost all of our pupil premium budget on tutoring for PP kids. For some it worked really well but there were so many issues that we had to abandon it. Many didn’t go or didn’t go consistently enough. Some parents felt annoyed that their child had been ‘unfairly targeted’ and simply refused it. Some tutors were better than others and even when the tutors were good and the children made progress in tutoring, they didn’t transfer it reliably enough into the classroom setting.

The best use of PP funding we have ever done is to employ an additional teacher to have smaller, full time classes. That resulted in the smallest gap for that year group but there was still a gap.

Agree with that user that's what I did in Science before I did my NQT. Best job over but it didn't go above 23k.

My oh did it in Maths too. It was an amazing job.

@PurpleDuvet that is appalling, but predictable. I guess we have to hope that the number of infections at the moment are so small that a few actual cases having been in contact with a bubble of children/staff isn't going to make that much difference? Unless they're a superspreader of course....

I don't know what the answer is unless a test can be developed that's simple enough to administer at school by staff, with an instant result!

Once autumn's here, you can see that schools would hardly ever be open if whole bubbles had to isolate every time one child had a temp or a cough, esp in areas where many ppl have to rely on public transport to get to a test centre. Which brings up the argument for moving testing to GP's surgeries.

The only mitigating factor would be to emphasise to parents that, the quicker you get Abigail/ Joel / Delilah tested and show us a negative result, the quicker (s)he can come back to school and you can get back to work.

As long as I don't have to do childcare or teaching of any children other than my own over the summer holidays, I literally don't care what the government provide. I unfollowed all my edutwitter stuff last night - the uncertainty was doing my head in, when really it's irrelevant to me. My Head is sensible, she's making the right decisions for everyone's safety, and she'll continue to do that. If it's just 'fun' over the summer, then there will be an academic catch up, if it's academic catch up over the summer by strangers who don't know the children, then academic catch up will still be required in September. I'm just planning as if we're back full time, with an eye on possibly only being in week on/week off (because I know that is the way my head will go).

For my school, this opens up concerns over BAME staff. The report is meant to have published its findings yesterday, but it's now next week. Who knows what that will do to the workforce in general (which is why they are sitting on it I assume). Again, my head will make the right decisions.

Oh, and parents are being dicks. Now that school is 'back', they are letting children who aren't in bubbles together, play together. I had to drag my child away from the park (where they were also on swings) - but it's not fair on school staff. They've sent a message out saying that they know the children will play together on the way home, but please stick to bubble-mates.

Does anyone know of any schools that are temperature-checking children on arrival?

@callmeangelina, my DC's primary school are, and during the day as well according to the kids! It was something we agreed to when we signed up for a key-worker place.

I'm wondering how common it is.

My school will be temp-checking from Monday.

Including staff!

No temp checking here. Not for my school (obviously, we're invincible apparently 😉), and not for any of the kids attending dd's school either.

I'm with you goats. I am not doing anything over the summer, not even the general planning I would do because it's been such a shit show that I can see it being a waste of time.

I've taught for almost 30 years - I shall be winging it in September until we see wtf is happening and have some clear idea from exam boards what next summer will involve.

And I'm so pissed off with parents - and, if I'm honest, the two thirds of all my students that have done fuck all work - that I won't be killing myself to catch them up. I will make helpful suggestions that involve them putting extra effort in, rather than me doing all the work as usual.

Just been informed by my child's school (via chair of the governors) that even if the SD thing goes from 2m to 1m, they will only be able to accomodate half the school at any one time, so unless advice changes significantly, it will be part time school. Either 2 days a week or week on week off.

Erk.

My primary school is doing temp checks on arrival and again four hours later.

@ohthegoats that's right, and will be the same for all/almost all schools because we pretty much all have desks for 2 rather than individual desks. So 2 kids sharing a desk can't possibly be 1m apart, they're lucky if they can stay 10 cm apart, they're crammed in next to each other. So we probably won't be able to open fully until there is no further need for social distancing. It's going to be a complete pain in the arse for anyone who needs childcare, but I don't know any schools that would physically be able to accommodate any social distancing with full classes.

No temp checking at my school. How many adults are in each day for those in primary?

Article in the guardian.

The catch-up scheme is likely to include vouchers for online tutoring through existing organisations, and the use of volunteers enrolled in programmes offering classes and activities over the summer and following months – modelled on the popular NHS volunteer scheme launched in March.

www.theguardian.com/education/2020/jun/13/schools-and-councils-in-england-not-consulted-over-summer-catch-up

I think if you put them at either end of a desk they'd be 1m apart, but then they'd be facing each other which goes against lots of other workplace guidance saying side-by-side or back-to-back is much safer. I've seen over countries have little plastic booths for students (see-through screens around each desk), imagine the uproar if they were brought in...

I've seen over countries have little plastic booths for students (see-through screens around each desk), imagine the uproar if they were brought in...

The behaviour around them would be shocking. They would write on them, stick pics on them. Spray them. Pick at them. Shake them, break them and push each other into them.