The Seventeenth Republic - The Pick Your Grade Show continues as we edge towards INSET days.

[StaffAssociationRepresentative]

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. It is meant for school staff only – a sort of room of requirement. Baiters, haters, goaders 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 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
Do not give ‘The Every twat for Themselves mob’ the staffroom password as a number of them are operating in an alternative reality.

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 goad us then that is not allowed in the staffroom. Close the door quietly on your way out

@NeurotrashWarrior

Sooo, someone in an NEU fb group has said that the hoo Har in the media around masks in schools and urging Boris to reconsider is a distraction from the main issues of safety.

Thoughts?

Yes, someone from WHO on R4 this morning stressed that masks need to be in conjunction with other safety measures. We are not going to get the space and standard of cleaning we need to keep us as safe as someone in an office, but they are going to stand there and swear black is white in front our faces anyway.

Oh, and add parental sense of responsibility to Things We Cannot Have. There will be parents who dose their dc up with calpol and send them in.

@Saucery

Oh, and add parental sense of responsibility to Things We Cannot Have. There will be parents who dose their dc up with calpol and send them in.

As well as the parents who collect their ill child 5 minutes before the end of the day, when they were called at lunchtime.

@Saucery too true. The child who vomited all the way down the corridor told me that he'd been sick three times that morning before school. Thanks, parents! I really felt for him too - no one wants to be the year 10 doing that.

What does guidance on illness look like where you are?

I haven't seen ours yet, but DD's nursery are willing to take them with a cough following a negative test.

I'm wondering what the party line will be on a persistently coughing child (or staff member for that matter) if they've tested negative?

But what if they just SAY they tested negative?

@WhyNotMe40

But what if they just SAY they tested negative?

And that is why the guidance is SO wrong saying we can’t ask for evidence of a negative test.

I'm actually very unsure what the guidance is for our nursery re symptoms etc and our school tbh. On my list for clarification this week in both places.

Yes, there's a woefully inadequate level of money being given to schools to deal with this.

Eg in no way should staff be cleaning and yet I believe they are. I am in effect tbh though have been given some ta hours which I've never had, to keep on top of resources.

If you have a negative test you can return. It is only ‘advised’ that you continue to stay off if you don’t have the 3 main symptoms.
Plus, you’ve got to cough continuously for an hour or more for it to be a symptom. Stopwatches at the ready, people! As well as teach a class, observe strict distancing and clean as you go you now have to time from the exact moment Fred starts coughing. How that works with 50 min lessons with different teachers I’m not sure....

twitter.com/10downingstreet/status/1298227687211913218?s=21

Ask the PM your questions about the return to school here. The thread suggests that people aren’t impressed.

Ours have to go outside the classroom to cough. That much I do know, and then sanitise their hands. Maybe we'll log it on SIMs every time they do that until they reach an arbitrary number determined as 'persistent'.

Surely today's 'distraction' is the Last Night of the Proms nonsense? Unless mask debate is meant to be a distraction from the pressing matter over whether we are allowed to sing faintly racist ditties at a concert that may not happen.

@Frlrlrubert

Ours have to go outside the classroom to cough. That much I do know, and then sanitise their hands. Maybe we'll log it on SIMs every time they do that until they reach an arbitrary number determined as 'persistent'.

We'd get told off for too many SIMS logs

It's funny how schools work differently.

We log EVERYTHING on SIMs. It's the bane of my life sometimes. If I've had a disruptive group I can end up spending most of my break logging stuff on SIMs.

What do you lot think about (theoretically) ventilating classrooms for 15 minutes between different teachers? Maybe longer lessons to compensate for the extra "breaks" . Would also mean a longer working day, but if we had that plus masks it might help?

schoolsweek.co.uk/sally-collier-to-be-replaced-by-dame-glenys-stacey-as-ofqual-chief-regulator/

Ventilate how?

I know they do it in Germany but there were issues when they realised not all classrooms were ventilatable (?) even there?

I like the idea of being able to ventilate but I’ll already be working 8-4 in Sept, any longer and I wouldn’t be able to drop off or collect my children from wraparound. It’s going to be tight anyway! Plus I don’t think all rooms could be ventilated. Many just open onto long enclosed corridors.

I can't do longer days as we can't ask the ILs for childcare.

I've just opened work email again. While I was online, our deputy head emailed the plan for Inset. Nothing has changed in our RA from before the summer break - so that means we can wear masks if we want to (primary though). Inset is in phases, so not too many people together at once, I'm going to running my phase bit apparently (have not planned for this, will not plan for this, we'll just have a chat about what's realistic).

I'm on holiday with a friend who works in FE. She has 4 hour long lessons with adults. They should probably all be wearing masks, right? At the moment she hasn't had a plan from her college.

I was thinking about maybe fitting window fans or other ways. I know it's impractical, just musing really.

The Daily Mail have a new incorrect article

The NEW school rules for the Class of Covid: How contact sport will be avoided, pupils will be in age group 'bubbles' and if two children get sick the WHOLE year is sent home when classes restart in September

The whole year...

Who wants to burst their socially distanced bubble

Possibly that the u turn will placate teachers when there are other greater issues at play?

Fair to late to placate me .... I despise Gav and the DfE. They are about as much use as a wet fart in a storm.

I have no respect at all for them. They are titting about working out how many kids walk/bus/cycle/train to cycle and creating pretty pie charts instead how about ensuring all schools are cleaned properly before the start of term ?

@Ickabog

The Daily Mail have a new incorrect article

The NEW school rules for the Class of Covid: How contact sport will be avoided, pupils will be in age group 'bubbles' and if two children get sick the WHOLE year is sent home when classes restart in September

The whole year...

Who wants to burst their socially distanced bubble

twats .....

We will never be in.

Anyway the latest from my school is the idea that we have three super sized bubbles one for each key stage. So will that mean if two in our bubble are ill then the whole key stage is out??

Supersized bubbles - bigger is better allegedly.