The Fortieth Republic - Schools are safe but they are vectors so go online

[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

Can I ask , I’m a ta in primary . Just been informed all tas expected in every day to teach key worker kids and teachers are working from home . My SIL just messaged , same at her school . Seems very unfair . Is it the norm??

@NeurotreeWenceslas

Thanks staff!

Asking again; Primary staff, is your school intending to send stuff like geography, RE and art or Dt home?

Although it sounds like most are being led by the TAs and the teacher does all the planning? We can't really do that :/

My school is sending all subjects home. They are also doing a day in school with KW but looking like we have a lot more children in that last time so how much of a rota itll be us yet to be seen.

All staff in today but no children, lots of planning and printing. Lots of us wearing masks and being careful and HT also said shes aiming for small bubbles despite there being no mention of bubbles in the guidance.

There seems to be a lot of talk on various groups about who should be offered a school place.

If it’s ‘anyone with one KW parent’ and ‘anyone who doesn’t work well at home’-we’ll soon be up to normal class levels and in that case, back at risk. I hope the union address this.

I think a cap should be made on class sizes and heads allowed to make the decision on how many classes they can safely staff, whilst still allowing staff enough time to provide quality remote learning.

We are definitely in school. Moving rooms following our normal timetable. Key worker and Teams at the same time.

I've heard there's an NEU meeting tonight and NASuWT tomorrow.

@rumncoke

Can I ask , I’m a ta in primary . Just been informed all tas expected in every day to teach key worker kids and teachers are working from home . My SIL just messaged , same at her school . Seems very unfair . Is it the norm??

A lot of members on the TA page I'm on have said similar. Definitely not fair for us to have all the face to face risk but the guidance on remote learning is putting more pressure on teachers. LSAs were all in from June last year but seem to be on a rota this time but not sure how often. My CT are part time so imagine I'm in more than them.

All teachers were contacted on Sunday to ask how they felt about safety and returning. Not one support worker was asked. That has not engendered a feeling of good will among us, I can tell you.

That's poor, Saucery. My goodwill is pretty much gone, so I wasn't planning on volunteering (although of course I'll cover anything I'm put on rota for). In our school (Secondary), the PE staff are covering KW children for the most part.

@ValancyRedfern

Re. Treatment of support staff: This is where I feel both support and teaching staff being in the same union makes such a massive difference. In my school support staff are mainly NEU as we all came together over the last couple of years to fight a bullying head. They are being treated the same as teachers in regard to safety measure and working from home (with the exception of roles which have to be on site such as cleaners). I think partly because we are all NEU we are all working together and our reps discussed section 44 with slt on all of our behalfs.

Agree. Staff spread across 3 or 4 unions in my school, so very little coordination in a major H&S situation like this. I suspect the teaching staff were asked if they ‘felt safe’ in case a significant number of them had been mobilised enough to follow the NEU advice. Whereas support staff are ‘just’ Unison and seen as a bit thick/desperate for the money and highly unlikely to question what they are being asked to do. When you have TAs openly stating “well, I’m not getting the vaccine, you don’t know what’s in it” and “this new strain doesn’t kill people” you can see how SLT have got that impression, frankly. According to the Head, the danger point for spread is 6 people in the (large) staffroom. Not the 20 children and 4 adults in one classroom for 5 hours, then? Okay.

@Monkeytennis97

DH is having a breakdown trying to switch from one screen to another on Teams. He has resorted to emailing all YouTube links to kids to avoid it. Dreading tomorrow when I'll be teaching and not able to help him in the other room😳😩

When he schedules the meetings, suggest he puts the links in the messagey bit

NEU meeting starting at 5pm:

www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=685991022097867&ref=notif&notif_id=1609865181628097&notif_t=live_video

There seems to be a lot of talk on various groups about who should be offered a school place.

If it’s ‘anyone with one KW parent’ and ‘anyone who doesn’t work well at home’-we’ll soon be up to normal class levels and in that case, back at risk. I hope the union address this.

That’s us. Over half the school in and possibly more expected.

Well, i'm teaching a bubble of 18 kids AND doing online stuff. Apparently the world and his wife are keyworkers and vulnerable now. We've even got kids in who are "unable to learn at home". I steadfastly sat in my classroom on teams while everyone else was in the hall. The head spoke to me about my "anxiety". It's not anxiety. It's sensible fucking caution!

We literally have over half the school in!

18 kids in today. More staff than kids!!!

Support staff are being treated terribly.

I'm picking up feelings that many staff are v cross that we are all in, running staff meetings with everyone in etc.

I'd like to tell you the % of children we have in but I can't do percentages (not my area!)

It's probably %80-85.

@phlebasconsidered

Well, i'm teaching a bubble of 18 kids AND doing online stuff. Apparently the world and his wife are keyworkers and vulnerable now. We've even got kids in who are "unable to learn at home". I steadfastly sat in my classroom on teams while everyone else was in the hall. The head spoke to me about my "anxiety". It's not anxiety. It's sensible fucking caution!

We literally have over half the school in!

Perhaps someone should speak to him/her about his/her lack of risk awareness.

We've got a much higher number in than before. There are some who are taking the piss though - children with a SAHP in because the working parent is a key worker. I genuinely think some people don't understand the purpose of closing schools.

Last time our support staff were all all home until June. My 1:1 TA joined every lesson and worked with my student throughout but she was an isolated example.
Cover supervisors, learning mentors etc weren't redeployed at all. This time, they've been asked to go in, and they're really not happy.

This time, they've been asked to go in, and they're really not happy.

If they are in bubbles of less than 15 and working the hours they are paid to work, then that's fine. Same risk as back in March when lots of us were in the whole time.

They are.
Interestingly it's not the TAs complaining...

Sorry if I missed it is anyone else doing Teams lessons but at the same time delivering it to the keyworker kids on the white board.

I was in the whole of last lockdown and I'll be in the whole of this one. My day today was busier than a normal school day! It's ridiculous that schools still have such high numbers in, and I bet the numbers will grow week by week as parents and kids get frustrated.

We've been told teachers are to focus on teaching and must WFH so I guess our KW/vulnerables will be being mainly looked after by support staff. However we don't have that many in (secondary) and they will be socially distanced, so this does make sense from a workload point of view and in reality is much safer for the support staff than the weeks before Christmas.

OK, I am going to bite and comment on two other threads.

A teacher posted about WFH and not being able to do vital safeguarding work (after all this is why we have been told we are so crucial!) and not being able to get KW place. Was told to suck it up by many posters.

A poster who works in a similar role but not in a school has just posted more or less the same and been told to send her kids to school. She cannot possibly be expected to WFH with kids around.

But MN doesn't hate teachers. Oh no.

Neurotree it's no. of pupils in/no. of pupils on roll x 100.