The Thirty-seventh Republic - Mass testing rolls on - school staff remain expendable

[SantaAssociationRepresentitve]

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 staffroom password just in case it attracts the wrong sort

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 booze is stashed - Thirsty Tuesdays, Fizz Fridays now in operation.

If you come with a stick to goad us then that is not allowed in the staffroom and you will receive a detention

I read that somewhere, too pud : which would be craaazy. And actively discourage some of them from testing ,too.

Plus the management of online lessons when some are not there for one because of their LFT! Gahhhh.

Oh Oak oh Oak, WHY have you not got a wider range of subjects???

I hate my autocorrect. Sorry about my errors in my last post.

Oh Oak oh Oak, WHY have you not got a wider range of subjects???

Completely agree. They have the funds to. Teachers get paid £100 per lesson already. Could easily be expanded for more A Level subjects too.

@Piggyinblankets

I also still don't get how our students are supposed to get to schol for testing during a week that they are remote learning??

Anyone? Anyone??

They don't.

They test when they return, not before.

I wrote a resignation letter in the summer but was persuaded not to submit it by the tiered schools approach. Which was obviously yet another lie.
If we dont strike or do a section 44 walkout in dusting it off and getting signed off for the duration of the notice period (I do actually have MH conditions).
And I'm withdrawing my kids from school to home educate.

Woke up this morning hoping that yesterday had been a bad dream.

I had planned to do some work today but I am so clueless with what is happening in my school I am just going to ignore it for now.

Gleaming

I'm going to ask the Gp for some more beta blockers. I don't take them often but they're very useful at times.

I'm also going to be refusing to do any extra work beyond what's part of actual teaching and what I'm doing for my own subject.

Why are they seeming to use the data for ages 5-9 to close primaries when that doesn't include year 6?

Fuck me they're so SHIT!!!!!!!

Morning all
Another day, another stress-induced headache. At least with secondaries going to remote learning for a couple of weeks, my DDs will be safer at home. It’s cold comfort when DH and I are both going out among the spores, but there is some risk reduction there for our family as a whole, I suppose.

It's another Kafkaesque point, isn't it?

Have the age range data reflect the middle school system but clearly give no identification whatsoever that you realise the middle school system exists when issuing guidance.

I have written my resignation, too, but what's the point? We have to work until Easter regardless... And the worst of it should be over by then?

No we don't have to work until Easter. Get signed off. Or use a section 44.

Actually if enough of us get signed off or do a section 44 then we are doing our colleagues a favour as schools will have to close.

@phlebasconsidered

Why are they seeming to use the data for ages 5-9 to close primaries when that doesn't include year 6?

Fuck me they're so SHIT!!!!!!!

Because if they used datasets that included children up to 11 years old, they'd have no choice but to close significantly more primary schools. It isn't accidental: it's calculated.

No email from SLT here yet but a nicely reassuring one from the NEU rep who seems to be the only person with any influence in college who actually reads the government stuff and has sufficiently developed critical thinking skills to be able to foresee issues in it. Apparently they’re meeting today and she’ll feed back (but it might have been nice for them to let us know that...)

I find it genuinely shocking that primary schools can have a per 100k rate of positive cases that is nearly ten times higher than the national average (and far above the level needed to qualify for tier 4) and still be completely open. It's absolute madness.

Have you seen the schools reopening guidance

"In relation to working in schools, while it is not possible to ensure a totally risk-free environment, there is no evidence that children transmit the disease any more than adults, and no evidence that staff in education settings are at any greater risk of fatal outcomes than many other occupations."

I mean, wtf? It should be reassuring that children don't transmit the disease more than adults? Or that there's no evidence of risk of fatal outcomes than many other occupations?

Also, that is totally watered down from what they were previously saying. The evidence is increasingly showing that schools are not safe.

I’ve just listened to Gav banging on and on about how “the rollout of mass testing” is going to be our salvation.

I’d love to know to what extent this is actually happening. Has anyone heard of anything concrete? Our school put out a request for parent volunteers on 18/12, but nothing since.

Yes, I've looked at this again.

Compare with where we now know the new variant is and it's blindingly obvious that primary is as much of an issue as secondary.

@noblegiraffe yes noticed that.

I so want to see the attendance figures for the last week of term. I think it’s criminal they are hidden

I will not be doing any testing or supervising it. This is not covered by school insurance as it's a medical procedure. And can't be done from 2m away and I'm always being told to keep 2m away from students. So nope, not in my job description.

@noblegiraffe
I mean, wtf? It should be reassuring that children don't transmit the diseasemorethan adults?

The thing is, the evidence is there to say that there are higher rates in children, both primary and secondary, than there are in the communities. Statistically, you are more likely to meet an infected child than an infected member of any other age group.

So that statement is absolute bullshit.

@HipTightOnions

I’ve just listened to Gav banging on and on about how “the rollout of mass testing” is going to be our salvation.

I’d love to know to what extent this is actually happening. Has anyone heard of anything concrete? Our school put out a request for parent volunteers on 18/12, but nothing since.

Do you think he's so thick he actually believes this guff?

So testing is now mandatory?