The broom cupboard 3 - for briefly stranded republicans

[TheHoneyBadger]

First in tops up the gin supplies and turns on the tea urn.

Had inset yesterday and I came home feeling shell shocked. Everything feels so disorganised. I don't feel at all prepared and even had a little cry once I was home.

Children in today so at least it will be nice to see them but didn't sleep a wink last night and I'm tired before I've even started.

Have a good day if you're back in today.

Another one who hasn’t slept. Lots of changes at our school which means lots more work. I’m going full time this year and I’m now scared I won’t cope. Kids are back today so game face on!!

Completely back to normal here except we have a touch points cleaner in the middle of the day still. We've had no masks since the govt removed from guidance in May, as well (zero cases whilst masks were in place, BTW, then fucking loads)

Not slept for days so here goes

Bless you both.

Scarlet you must have thought you were ready and I bet you weighed up your decision well and that was likely more rational than what your feeling now in September panic mode.

Name it so easily feels impossible and chaotic and wtf on first days back but it all seems to work out and fall together. Good luck today.

Haven’t posted for ages, mostly just lurk! We had inset yesterday - and a handful of children who need a little extra transition popped in in the afternoon to see their classroom/teaching staff. First thing one tells me is his sister is positive…I was hoping we might get at least a little of term out of the way before we had that happen!! Oh well - all in today and my own children already had it over the summer (Sod’s law innit!) so at least they should be safe from catching it again for a little while!

@SoFranCisco We've had 5 families say kids are having to isolate and we don't go back till today.....

@namechangedyetagain you will be fantastic. That first inset is always information overload but once the current are in you'll know what to do.

Hope today goes well for everyone!

Gods luck everyone!

Just Inset for me today but I've barely slept - paranoid about oversleeping!

Thank you HoneyBadger. I’m definitely just panicking! Good luck everybody!!

Last day of the holidays for me. I should have plans to make the most of it but will probably spend the day watching Netflix.

Setting my alarm very early tomorrow so can sort my classroom out before the main Inset starts.

zero cases whilst masks were in place, BTW, then fucking loads)

Story across the board in Secondary wasn’t it?

I still never understand the still repeated demands from many with nothing to do with education, of ‘we must get back to normal and if anything goes wrong, it’s because you must be doing it all wrong or it’s to be expected, why are you moaning?!’ when the most normal (i.e all back in school and stay that way) can really only be achieved with some simple mitigations.

Still no sign of those CO2 monitors too

Good luck today all those in

I still keep seeing threads about schools imposing their own mitigation measures. Are they being honest? We’re keeping remote parents evenings but that’s all. It’s all back to normal at my own children’s school too. Well I think so. I know the wraparound kids are all back together in the hall which I’m glad about. I can go back to standing by my car and shouting ‘get in’ rather than having to take them in separate doors. I have the gift of time!

Back to normal here too. I think they completely fail to understand how much work and extra staffing and logistical problems go in to the mitigations we had last year. So they can't grasp that we want them because it will keep kids in school for longer if we can keep infection levels down.

Things like staggered lunches meant more duties and weird timetabling, staggered starts and ends meant longer days for many and logistical nightmares with transport, zones meant running round in the rain between blocks with all of your equipment in tow etc. Most schools will be relieved to not have to deal with those issues and some of them (like zones where kids were stuck in one room for too many hours a day) were detrimental to education and kids wellbeing in some ways but something as simple as masks was absolutely fine for the vast majority of students and staff (and if not you could be exempted) and only seems to have caused nightmare for weird conspiracy theorists who aren't in schools anyway. Utterly bizarre how crazed and outraged they are by such a simple thing.

Anyway it is what it is and what it aint it aint. Once more into the...

We're pretty much back to normal too.

I wasn't feeling too bad about it all until two separate friends told me about their two separate friends, one in their 40s and one in their 50s, who recently caught Covid and died, despite both being healthy and double jabbed.

Fuck Iam! I'm not sure whether I wish you'd kept that to yourself. Which goes to show even those of us on the side of being realistic are inclined to want to stick our fingers in our ears. That's awful! Hope your friends are ok and it hasn't freaked you out too much.

To be honest, this morning, I feel like I'm back to how I felt before I even had my first jab only this time public transport is packed, the majority are unmasked and now I'll be sat directly with children, working closely together, at all times of the day.

I'm reassuring myself that statistically it had to happen somewhere and that's a complete rarity that doesn't mean anything about the disease in the medium to long term. But part of me can't help but to go back to seeing every person around me as posing a potential risk again.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9947419/Teachers-NO-likely-hospitalised-Covid-study-reveals.html

I’m sure we’ll see more articles like this over the next week or so.

Yes, but there were mitigations : these same scientist should be connecting those dots and pushing to keep them in place.

Teachers are quite a physically healthy bunch, as it points out, and they also suggest we were able to/took more steps to protect ourselves. That rug has now been pulled away...

I do need to reflect on the fact , of course, that I caught covid whilst not at work...

Really going all out ...

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58418767

‘Schools are not Covid hubs’.

I felt much safer last summer before vaccinations - this time last year we were on a quick break in that London, not a chance I’d want to do that today, despite being double jabbed. I don’t think I have a hope in hell of not getting it, living with another teacher and two secondary kids not old enough to have a vaccine. I’m so angry that we’re supposed to be ok with what’s being done to us. I’d love for covid to have gone away, but it hasn’t and I feel like I’m being gaslighted about the risks.

I feel the same @CarrieBlue and in the same position - although have 2 primary DC.

I just hope DH and I aren’t ill at the same time so can manage the kids!

@motherrunner - at least my two can be ill without needing too much input from me or DH, you have my sympathy there xx

300,000 CO2 monitors won’t improve ventilation (mentioned in that article), we’ll just have the lack of it confirmed. Well, 10 rooms per school will. Prof Semple seems to get it better than the phe boss though.

@motherrunner

Really going all out ...

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58418767

‘Schools are not Covid hubs’.

I’ve just read that! Who is Dr Doyle?!

Annita wants to hear about measures in place in schools to prevent Covid transmission...

I’ve just read that! Who is Dr Doyle?!

Related to Dr Dolittle. She talks to the Government.

Dr Doyle might be Yvonne Doyle. Chief nurse. Pretty sure she isn't a Dr but she may have a doctorate so I don't like to assume. In a press release from DfE yesterday, Jenny Harries was an education expert...