The Fifty-first republic - twice weekly tests and wear masks at all time till Easter

[StaffRepFeistyClub]

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.

Do not give the staffroom password to others 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. Do not sit on the chairs and wear a mask.

It's really hard though. I'm totally against the testing instead of isolating but if I refuse (which I would) I'm just protecting others from my possibly infected child.
If others go along with it, it's my child (and lots of others) and my family who are unprotected.
I really hope this doesn't happen full scale.

Add in fucking up the holidays. God give me strength!

I hate the battle metaphor. It's a virus, not an army!

Add in fucking up the holidays. God give me strength

I’m one of those odd teachers that wouldn’t mind a shorter summer (as long as the lost week is added on to the June / October half term).

I’m an NQT though. Maybe I’ll change my mind over the next few years.

I wouldn't mind now my child is grown up. And we don't usually go away for more than a week and don't often even do that. Trouble is, it can't be added onto May half term (exams). It was nice the one year our county had a two week October half term, though.

Losing that chunk of the summer would bother me greatly.

I'd take a week off summer to have an extra week at October or feb. That would be it.

Isn't the whole harvest thing a fallacy too?

Losing that chunk of the summer would bother me greatly

I’m not a fan of summer. Too hot for me. Some days I just want to hide indoors. Dh thinks I’m weird (he may have a point).

There is a debate to be had about term/holiday rearrangement but this is NOT the year to start pissing around with them.

Or next year, for that matter.

I’m often in a computer room with no air conditioning. Hot rooms made hotter by hot kids and hot computers spewing out hot air. It sucks. Really don’t want to prolong that if I don’t have to!

I’m not a fan of summer. Too hot for me. Some days I just want to hide indoors. Dh thinks I’m weird (he may have a point).

So you're not up for joining me in Death Valley in August? I have to admit that going for a walk when it was 115 degrees was perhaps a little silly!!

@MrsHamlet

I’m not a fan of summer. Too hot for me. Some days I just want to hide indoors. Dh thinks I’m weird (he may have a point).

So you're not up for joining me in Death Valley in August? I have to admit that going for a walk when it was 115 degrees was perhaps a little silly!!

That is not a holiday, that’s self imposed torture.

Tragically I’m pretty useless in the cold too.
And I don’t like wind. I’m a bit of a delicate flower weather wise

I found this autumn so tough. Would have loved a 2 week half term instead of 1 week.

I will work longer in the summer if every school gets air conditioning.

Which won't happen.

It is illegal to keep animals in the conditions we have to work in in the summer.

To be fair to Death Valley, that affected me less than the humidity in Texas. I went into the post office and the security guard said "ma'am is it raining?" in a tone of incredulity.
Nope... just sweating. That was awful.

I think the summer holidays are more to do with the Royal court, law courts and machinery of government historically leaving hot, smelly, plague-ridden London for the season. This shut down universities and schools as well because all were interconnected. Harvesting the earlier crops fits into this pattern.

Allow me to rant a moment...I work part-time. I have to leave work for part of the days I don't work. They keep texting my personal phone on my day's off asking about the work... It's written down AND I talk it through with the staff member.

This is added to the fact my manager told me to check my work emails on a day off in case what they had sent was important... because I once didn't reply to an email, sent on my non-work Friday before a holiday, until the last day of the holiday.

So frustrated with it all.

Hmmm

schoolsweek.co.uk/narrowing-attainment-gap-stopped-being-main-focus-of-dfe-in-2015-says-former-permanent-secretary/

No surprises there then.

Wankers.

@KatherineOfGaunt - I was asked what work I’d be getting done in the three hours trapped time I had on my timetable. I made a list of the housework I’d be doing at home in that time. The line manager asking was most put out that I wouldn’t be rewriting SoW for him.

Calum Semple is till banging this drum

“Schoolteachers are not mainly catching it from the children – when we did deep dives into schools, school teachers were catching it from each other in the common room.”

Where and where were these deep dives?? How could they possibly know this? Where are these common rooms of which he speaks?

The four colleagues I know if who have had definite covid definitely did not catch it in the common room. They may not , equally, have caught it form students but it is very clear they didn't catch it from fellow staff.

Does Semple realise how cold he sounds?

www.tes.com/news/teachers-have-excess-covid-risk-during-lockdown

[quote motherrunner]Shortening summer holidays back on the table too: inews.co.uk/news/education/gavin-williamson-shorter-summer-holiday-five-term-school-year-899127?ito=social_ifb_theipaper&fbclid=IwAR25YzFKabBwB3nSLTrJ2FFe7pOnwvZv2o2mWSDmKYrsEnHqLBQ04JK1EYU[/quote]
OMG-that article. He is such a twat.

Is he just talking about losing a week of holidays-not moving it anywhere? Would they have to rewrite contracts/burgundy book for that?

Who the hell still has a ‘common room’!?
Absolute rubbish.
I see it everywhere. Teachers and school staff are the only people who aren’t allowed to say they caught Covid at work and if they did, it’s their fault.

[quote CarrieBlue]@KatherineOfGaunt - I was asked what work I’d be getting done in the three hours trapped time I had on my timetable. I made a list of the housework I’d be doing at home in that time. The line manager asking was most put out that I wouldn’t be rewriting SoW for him.[/quote]
Good for you! I'm a bit of a wimp so not good at standing my ground about things like this. But I do resent texts while I'm eating breakfast with my toddler on a non-working day.

WTF is a common room? Sounds like something in Harry Potter.

Talking of Betsy de Thierry

twitter.com/WillPsyc/status/1367465781500514306/photo/2

@ChloeDecker

Who the hell still has a ‘common room’!? Absolute rubbish. I see it everywhere. Teachers and school staff are the only people who aren’t allowed to say they caught Covid at work and if they did, it’s their fault.

Exactly this.

If a poor nurse got covid at work, it’s dreadful and she was being a hero. If a teacher gets it, its probably because she was being completely unprofessional in the ‘common room’ with loads of other completely unprofessional teachers.