The Forty First Republic - Gav encourages parents to report schools to OFSTED

[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

Is it today the government are releasing the school attendance figures for the end of December??

@SansaSnark

Tiny complain- I made a recorded powerpoint for Y10 physics, and I've set it for two classes today. It's accessible through office 365, but students need to request access. When they follow the link, there are two really obvious options- one saying "request access from admin".

About 30% of my students, instead of clicking this option, email/comment and say they can't access the powerpoint. I then have to grant them access manually, which is marginally more time consuming.

People talk about teens being tech savvy, and I know some of it is work avoidance, but you would think they could all use their brains and just click "request access"!

I don't think doing 4 or 5 hours a day of live lessons is sustainable for anyone- the kids will get burn out too.

Kids really aren't tech savvy at all. This assumption absolutely boils my proverbial. They don't know how to do anything tech related that is office or work based or actually useful in life (with a few exceptions).

@Beachhuts90

Has anyone figured out a way for one meeting organiser to allow another one to have the same privileges?

The remote learning team last week set our daily catch ups in Teams calendars, but the team working remotely this week (including me) can't 'start' the meeting, we all just wait around endlessly waiting to be admitted by someone who is not scheduled to join all week. Usually the Microsoft site has a tutorial for everything but I couldn't find this specific issue.

You can make someone else a presenter and I don't think you have to be live at the time to do so. You can join the meeting at any time once it is scheduled with a second person and then click on them to allow them to present. I assume those privileges remain once you've left and then rejoined the meeting at the correct time although I don't know for sure.

Have just had the Attendance email appu. Which was not expecting as they said 18th. However this turns out o be a summary for the year from April. Haven't clicked they tobthe qctual figures yet but they sure have a lot to say about how this data can and can't be used ....

Attendance in education and early years settings during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak
THIS IS THE LATEST DATA
Published: 12 January 2021
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A summary of attendance in education settings from Monday 23 March to Monday 4 January (excluding out of term dates as data not collected) and early years settings from Thursday 16 April to Thursday 7 January. The data covers England only.
This publication provides a high-level summary of estimates from the Department for Education's education settings survey and local authority early years survey. Further data at national and local authority level is available in the underlying data.
These statistics have been produced quickly in response to developing world events. The Office for Statistics Regulation, on behalf of the UK Statistics Authority, has reviewed themm_ against several key aspects of the Code of Practice for Statistics and regards them as consistent with the Code’s pillars of Trustworthiness, Quality and Value.
Expansion of publication content in January 2021
We are working to expand the scope of published data in future releases. In addition to measures currently published, from 19 January 2021 we will publish workforce absence data backdated for the autumn term and update this weekly.
We will also publish local authority level measures of workforce absence and early years data for the autumn term on 19 January 2021. We will then publish local authority level summaries on a half-termly basis.
Data sharing
Data collected from the Education Settings Survey is shared as management information across national and local government for operational purposes. As part of the data share we explicitly highlight that the information is for internal purposes only and should not be shared more widely. The limitations of the data, which include variables with missing values, responses not being validated or issues being thoroughly investigated are highlighted to ensure recipients are aware that decisions should not be made in isolation and the risks of making conclusions based on the data alone. We engage with local users to try to prevent the data being shared inappropriately. Where we identify misuse of the data we work with those in receipt of the data to understand how it happened and to reduce the likelihood it will happen again.
Information shared across government includes variables that we have made a conscious decision not to share more widely at the present moment for a number of reasons including the quality of the data which could misinform or confuse users, however, they may provide useful insight for operational purposes, particularly at a local level.
The department is continuously reviewing what and how information collected from the survey is disseminated and we will endeavour to publish data at the earliest opportunity.

Oo Oo, Miss, Miss....

it does have data for the last week of term - contrary to what they said they were going to do (very confusing!):

On 16 December attendance in state-funded secondary schools was 72%, down from 80% on 10 December.

Attendance "well below 80%" in London and South East.

Kids really aren't tech savvy at all. This assumption absolutely boils my proverbial. They don't know how to do anything tech related that is office or work based or actually useful in life (with a few exceptions).

I agree- the current generation of kids are so used to apps which are made incredibly user friendly, they aren't really sure what to do when anything goes wrong.

In terms of being able to do anything useful, they are mostly incredibly weak.

Checking some of the data tables attached:

London school attendance for the last week of term was 67%. This is by far the lowest figure for any region, for any week in the autumn term. North West or Humber around half term only reach high 70s.

Scrolling through an excel spreadsheet I find that attendance in secondary schools in Redbridge on 16th December was 17%

In fact attendance in most London schools that week is dire.

Attendance in Greenwich that week was 47% for primary and secondary.

Well worth the threatened court case. I’m sure they learned a lot.

What do you mean noble?

And at 17%!!! Didn't spot that one. Let's hope journalists do. Boris et al must have been at least anecdotally aware of those figures when they told us all how safe schools were and opened primaries last Monday.

The kids forced back into school in Greenwich for the last week.

Last week of term before Christmas + less than half the kids in = not much learning going on.

And given that Greenwich is now totally fucked in terms of covid figures, I don’t think Gav can make the argument that it was worth it.

Kent and Medway also had fewer than half the kids in that last week. Secondary was 34% and 33%

That’s the effect of the new variant.

Wow... is this in the press yet??

Where are you all seeing this??

@noblegiraffe

Kent and Medway also had fewer than half the kids in that last week. Secondary was 34% and 33%

That’s the effect of the new variant.

Doesn't surprise me at all...

Weekly attendance figures email, don't know if it's actually published anywhere. You can sign up for it (link in my first post re this) but don't know if that would give you today's email.

Kind of knew what you meant noble, just clarifying.

I can't get my head around how they thought they were opening schools this term. OK I suppose they weren't in London etc but even so.

@cornercupboard

Beachhuts90 we have had this problem too, but can't see a way to do it. We have had to add new meetings. Pain in the neck! Then there are 2 conflicting meetings and the children don't know which to join.

Thank you for the reply! I'm glad we aren't the only ones having this problem--sounds like a Teams problem.

Thank you also @RandomGrammarPun, the problem with that is that the person who made the meetings is not able to log on as she is with the kw/v kids all week. Ah well. She has cancelled her version and we have put in a new one for this week, might have to do that from now on!

@RigaBalsam good that you are off xx

explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/attendance-in-education-and-early-years-settings-during-the-coronavirus-covid-19-outbreak

After the preamble at the top before the headline stats click ‘download associated files’, you want table 1C

No worries. She could have signed in with a phone or something in school? We are massively multitasking... In school supervising KW 50% of time, nipping off to do our own live lessons, and on our phones helping colleagues to man the chat on their live lessons on our phones at the same time!

Oh yes and Riga I'm glad you are off and hope you soon start to feel better.

@noblegiraffe it won't let me open it wahhhh! Says corrupted or something. If you get a chance can you screenshot it please x

Thanks all.

The doctor recommended exercise but it makes me paranoid going for a run or walk when I off incase someone judgy sees me. I mean am not there yet but maybe next week. Surely this is ok though?

Hmm I am paranoid all round.

Exercise indoors until you feel less paranoid? Or maybe you need to just do it anyway. Keep telling yourself that, if challenged, you could choose to tell them you'd been working hard the previous evening so you could exercise in daylight. Think that's what I'd do and would sort of work for me.

Of course, you shouldn't feel guilty at all, especially as the doc has "prescribed" it! Would it feel better doing with a friend, or more open to accusation?