Re-opening Schools?

[purenarcotic]

I thought Sage were still saying to keep primaries open. And with only 11sand 13s coming in, gov could argue they're following the advice.
I'm a lifetime teaching union member but they have no power here. My head has already organised the vaccines and informed parents.

Organised what vaccines? I wasn’t aware they were now being offered to school staff?

 

[Mattym]

It's scarcely credible in the face of Independent Sage recommendations/advice and statements/pleas from Teaching unions to delay the return of schools they're pressing on anyway, and calling in the army to do tests of kids. Utterly poisonous

I was delighted to finally see my union (or the regional branch) finally make some sort of Facebook post yesterday as to what sort of safety measures need to be put in place, which included vaccines for staff. Now I realise that there are higher priorities than teachers, but the union had previously said 'We back the need for teachers to have the vaccination'. Their lethargy made me very cross.

 

[Steel Icarus]

UK government scientists tell Boris Johnson to close schools in January

Concern rises about new strains of coronavirus in the UK.

www.google.com

 

[Steel Icarus]

I thought Sage were still saying to keep primaries open. And with only 11sand 13s coming in, gov could argue they're following the advice.
I'm a lifetime teaching union member but they have no power here. My head has already organised the vaccines and informed parents.

Do you mean "tests" rather than "vaccines"?

 

[Thora]

I'm sure it will be what I said.

I don’t have that much faith in Boris. Once all the papers are running stories they’re trying to soften us up for the u turn. I reckon it will fall somewhere in between the 4th January plan and the worst case scenario stories about Feb half term - probably in line with Scotland’s plans.

 

[nagapie]

Do you mean "tests" rather than "vaccines"?

Oops, yes, sorry.

 

[nagapie]

Organised what vaccines? I wasn’t aware they were now being offered to school staff?

Sorry, wrote the wrong word, now edited to tests.

 

[nagapie]

I don’t have that much faith in Boris. Once all the papers are running stories they’re trying to soften us up for the u turn. I reckon it will fall somewhere in between the 4th January plan and the worst case scenario stories about Feb half term - probably in line with Scotland’s plans.

There's still a lot of pressure to keep schools open.

 

[Thora]

The big problem will be if they shut schools, it will be difficult to open them again.
Numbers are so out of control at the moment - it took weeks of lockdown with schools closed to get it under control in April.
If they delay schools opening for 2 weeks or a month, will they be able to reopen them if deaths are still going up?

 

[clicker]

Admittedly it was a couple of weeks ago, but yes, I thought the carrot being dangled was that teachers spend their first week of term learning how to covid test pupils. And it was that which would make reopening schools safe. It seemed ambitious then and haven't heard mention of it since.

Just like they wouldn't reopen schools in September, without half attendance in school, reduced class sizes etc...again, that didn't happen but they opened regardless.

It didn't work in September. It won't now. Hoping for a u turn.

 

[nagapie]

Admittedly it was a couple of weeks ago, but yes, I thought the carrot being dangled was that teachers spend their first week of term learning how to covid test pupils. And it was that which would make reopening schools safe. It seemed ambitious then and haven't heard mention of it since.

Just like they wouldn't reopen schools in September, without half attendance in school, reduced class sizes etc...again, that didn't happen but they opened regardless.

It didn't work in September. It won't now. Hoping for a u turn.

The first bit of that is happening. My secondary is setting up testing for the first week. Not sure who's doing the testing, I've not been asked...yet.

 

[wtfftw]

The big problem will be if they shut schools, it will be difficult to open them again.
Numbers are so out of control at the moment - it took weeks of lockdown with schools closed to get it under control in April.
If they delay schools opening for 2 weeks or a month, will they be able to reopen them if deaths are still going up?

I dunno. They stuck to the reopening schedule in summer and the November lockdown was a set time.

 

[clicker]

The first bit of that is happening. My secondary is setting up testing for the first week. Not sure who's doing the testing, I've not been asked...yet.

That does seem a really sensible thing to do in theory. I wonder how it'll be sold to those doing the testing. A voluntary or compulsory part of their job? You'd hope they'd then at least be offered a vaccine sooner than the current list indicates.

 

[Thora]

I dunno. They stuck to the reopening schedule in summer and the November lockdown was a set time.

They didn’t close schools in November though (and cases were pretty low in the summer). I think it would be hard to reopen schools of case numbers are climbing.
The March school closures quickly went from a couple of weeks around Easter holidays to 6 months.

 

[wtfftw]

That does seem a really sensible thing to do in theory. I wonder how it'll be sold to those doing the testing. A voluntary or compulsory part of their job? You'd hope they'd then at least be offered a vaccine sooner than the current list indicates.

Dunno where I read it but apparently the kids will swab themselves under (presumably distanced) supervision.

 

[Thora]

.

 

[nagapie]

They didn’t close schools in November though (and cases were pretty low in the summer). I think it would be hard to reopen schools of case numbers are climbing.
The March school closures quickly went from a couple of weeks around Easter holidays to 6 months.

I honestly just can't imagine the gov shutting schools again like they did in March. They'll just keep it all running in dribs and drabs and pretend it's all ok.

 

[Steel Icarus]

They didn’t close schools in November though (and cases were pretty low in the summer). I think it would be hard to reopen schools of case numbers are climbing.
The March school closures quickly went from a couple of weeks around Easter holidays to 6 months.

Well, 3.5 months of school time where schools were closed.

 

[elbows]

I dunno. They stuck to the reopening schedule in summer and the November lockdown was a set time.

No, Johnson was originally calling for schools to reopen at the start of June but it soon became clear that wasnt going to happen so they gave up on it.

 

[wtfftw]

I meant other reopening things. They don't wait for the stats before reopening stuff over summer - not properly in a staggered way.

All I'm saying is that I think they could easily close schools for a set period of time and to hell with whether it does enough. They could easily do whatever really. Or not do anything at all.

 

[LDC]

Any chance of a student and staff strike on safety at work and public health grounds?

 

[maomao]

No, Johnson was originally calling for schools to reopen at the start of June but it soon became clear that wasn't going to happen so they gave up on it.

They had mostly reopened when he u-turned on that which meant those of us who just wanted to give it an extra week or two to see that local infection levels were genuinely low and dropping before sending our kids in were refused places.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Any chance of a student and staff strike on safety at work and public health grounds?

I suspect that not telling schools anything until the last minute is only partly down to incompetence, and that not giving unions time to respond to anything may be a feature, not a bug.

 

[elbows]

I meant other reopening things. They don't wait for the stats before reopening stuff over summer - not properly in a staggered way.

The summer relaxing of measures was done rather slowly and the stats at the time showed a completely different picture to the one we had when measures were introduced.

If the government were going for a total viral suppression strategy then the relaxations were too soon, but that was never their approach so it wasnt surprising. When not going for the total suppression approach I could even argue that some of their relaxations were a bit late, for example they were so slow to let those with medical conditions out of shielding that I'd say that stuff was slow on both ends, slow to come in and slow to be switched off, and dont even get me started on what they subsequently did with shielding advice.

Other large mistakes included the extent to which they tried to restore the economy via eat out to help out, encouraging city workers back to work, and creating a false impression that the relaxations were sustainable well past the summer. And of course when it came to schools, not listening to SAGE when they old them new restrictions were necessary for the public well before schools reopened, in order to create enough room in the infection picture to give schools a better chance of operating.

 

[nagapie]

Any chance of a student and staff strike on safety at work and public health grounds?

Not a chance. Parents and students are divided, many want a return. Teachers would be villified, as usual.

 

[elbows]

Any chance of a student and staff strike on safety at work and public health grounds?

We are fast approaching the point where I would be calling for a general strike if the government continue to blunder with doomed approaches in badly affected regions.

But I am not typical and most opposition is tame. Here for example are things said in a recent Gurdian article, which does leave some room open for individual action on the basis of unsafe working environment, but where proper strikes are not on the table.

Teaching unions called for the publication of updated safety guidance in light of the rapid spread of a new variant and moves to give staff priority access to the vaccine.

“Our worry is that they won’t make the right decision today and do what they have done all the way through the pandemic, which is to take an ideological line and get schools back before the testing programme can be properly put in place,” said Mary Bousted, the joint general secretary of the National Education Union (NEU).

“Many schools will still not be operating the testing programme if they are to open again on 4 January. Then in two or three weeks we would have to go into a longer shutdown as a result.”

While industrial action is not an option, she said the NEU would be strongly advising members that they have a legal right to work in a safe environment.

The general secretary of the NASUWT union, Patrick Roach, wrote to the education secretary to ask that schools be allowed to move to remote learning for all pupils, except those deemed to be vulnerable or the children of key workers, in the highest-tier areas. Roach called for teachers and other staff to be given priority access to the Covid-19 vaccines.

England school reopening in doubt with ministers divided

Education secretary under pressure to rethink plan for millions of pupils to return

www.theguardian.com

 

[elbows]

And I do expect a u-turn given how strong the warning signs are in hospital data for some regions at the moment.

 

[chilango]

They would love, and I wouldn't be surprised if this is at least mentioned in their discussions, to provoke a teachers' strike.

 

[gaijingirl]

So my school (like nagapie's) also wrote to parents at the start of the holidays with regards to when we would be reopening - reiterating the government's line at that time, but also added the caveat that they could not confirm details exactly and would not do so until they had firm details from the government and that this may well change. This also applies to the school testing - so we haven't put concrete plans into place for that yet either (although no doubt there are plans ready to be put into action). My head is very cautious and he won't jump until he knows exactly what is what. I am so grateful for that. He runs our school so well.

The current rumour is that the first week back (next week starting 4 Jan) will be online for all students including years 11+13, with those two year groups going back from the 11th and the rest to follow a week later:

Exclusive: New school opening delay agreed by ministers

Exam-year students will see return delayed by at least an extra week if plan worked out yesterday gets Downing Street sign-off

www.tes.com

 

[clicker]

BBC saying the army are on standby to 'help' with the testing in secondary schools. Just wondering if a school is a good place for false negatives and what are the rate of false negatives.