School “bubbles”

Jaxjacky

Yes totally agree that people need social interaction after isolation.

But that goes for parents too. What I was saying is, many of us have been in the social isolation of home schooling for six months.

That means that even the normal greetings that would occur at the school gate have been missing.

Yes, sure it is important for kids, but for parents having had to do home schooling it is also important.

Home schooling can be very isolating. Schools have colleagues, it experts, counsellors, dinner ladies, admin strutures, safeguarding strucutre, whereas if you are doing all that on your own, all those jobs, together with paid work, it becomes very important to stop in the park, say hello and a chat, if not a moan.

The point about pubs and restaurants is, why should that take precedence over the future and wellbeing of our kids and parents. I suggest it shouldn't.

And yes, I know jobs are important but the job of a parent has to be the most imporant one you will ever do.

greengrrengrass I understand your points. When lockdown was lifted in May a number of parents did socialise, many in bubbles. My daughter, with two grandchildren worked at school for key workers children, not all parents home schooling remained isolated.
I think we may have to agree to differ as I don’t believe pubs and restaurants took precedence, many parents have used both of these too.

Taking these one at a time:

Non teaching staff furloughed (especially TAs) - administrative work still needed to be carried out, whether their was pupil occupancy or not. Most schools did have some pupils, those of key workers and those children who, for various reasons, were deemed to be better off in school than at home with their parents. TA's were assisting with the pupils in school whilst the qualified teacher was holding Zoom lessons and setting and marking work for pupils to do from home.
Caretakers and grounds staff - School premises still need to be maintained, grass cut, boilers maintained, playground equipment maintained. In addition, work was already underway, in accordance with government guidelines that were changing daily, as to preparation for pupils returning i.e. removing all books, crayons, soft furnishings, pictures on walls, moving desks to safe distances. Deep clean of the whole school.
Resources- paper, photocopying, laminating. - These weren't being used except for the pupils of key workers and children who could not stay at home.
Catering and food costs - no food had been provided on school premises since lockdown. All children had to take a packed lunch. Frozen, tinned and dried foods have not been wasted; they can still be used in the future.
Transport - No idea what this refers to. School bus? Not used.

Schools have a duty of care and have to follow their particular Government's guidelines for keeping their pupils and staff safe and attempt to stop any infection spreading.

What parents choose to do outside school is not the schools' responsibility.
They may look on in despair but will know they have done their best.

If anyone is to be criticised, it’s surely the parents who aren’t socially distancing after school. It’s accepted that young children can’t do this spontaneously, although personally, I think if the playgrounds were that busy, I wouldn’t take my child there immediately after school. But adults can distance....and I think many aren't, hence the increase in numbers. Can you imagine the noise that would be made, if children were just going back to school without the staff making any effort to distance anyone....

I think the schools can only do their best the same as hairdressers, restaurants etc. Te children are not required to distance in their bubbles anyway and I'm not sure thousands have been spent, its more a case of turning all the desks to face front, washing hands every two minutes and queues for the toilets. Outside school, off school premises parents are supposed to use their common sense.

Chewbacca is right, little money was saved. Catering and cleaning are often outsourced to a company which is nothing to do with the school's finances. I haven't heard of admin staff and TAs being furloughed, but that doesn't mean they weren't. They are only paid in term time so we are looking at 15 weeks not 6 months.
Regarding paper and photocopying, many poorer pupils had to have work sent home by post as the promise of every pupil with a laptop didn't seem very well organised - too few sent or they didn't arrive until June/July. So postage was up and little saved on photocopying.

My friend’s seven year old daughter suffers with chronic asthma. She has needed to be hospitalised several time’s. Her mother is understandably nervous about the return to school, and for her the school precautions are very necessary. There must be many others like her, as well as staff.

My DIL is a teacher and said the most senior groups of teens have been the least inclined to observe distancing. Repeatedly coming to her desk to hand her work books etc.

Marking work books is now a 4 day process. Pupil has to place book in a box. Teacher mustn’t touch it for 2 days. Then after marking place in box and pupil mustn’t retrieve it for 2 days!

"why has this money been wasted"...........because the unions kicked up a stink

The money is only being ‘wasted‘ because people need assurance that schools are safe. Nobody can stop the idiots who then flock to parks, etc.

Elliane I can’t speak for all schools but
TA’s were not furloughed in our local Primary schools. They were on a rota together with teachers to support children of Key workers and those with SEND.
Caretakers were occupied doing maintenance e.g. at my local school painting all the woodwork outside the building, stripping and polishing floors etc. oh and fitting holders for all the sanitising equipment and cleaners were in every day school was open.
Grounds staff-are usually local authority and on contract through them. Savings through furlough for them did not benefit the schools.
Resources-there were some savings in terms of photocopying. Also there might be 1 term’s worth of books per pupil -except where the schools sent out exercise books for the children to do the work set each week on the internet.
Unfortunately those savings were not passed on to teachers working from home to provide lessons and resources, using their own internet provision, computers electricity and heating.
Some catering staff were in to provide food for those children mentioned above.
Providing and refilling sanitisers (around 70 at my local school), in at least 2 areas per classroom plus entrances and exits and toilets together with the fittings, along with wipes for computers and sprays for tables, chairs and other surfaces after each lesson was and continues to be a huge expense.

I’m not sure what you mean about transport. It saved one daughter over £400 in bus fares but how does that help the school?
The bubbles-are for the safety of children AND staff. Schools are doing their best. If the parents go off and socialise outside school there is nothing the school can do but the staff watch anxiously to see what might happen because of that behaviour.

The biggest chance of infection is not in the school yard or the park playground it is in the classroom. Bubbles will cut down the number of people who will need to be notified if there is a case. But it is far more likely that a child will pick up an infection inside than outside.

If these precautions and safety measures hadn’t been put in place parents would have complained anyway and probably refused to send their children to school. If parents choose to act in a way outside of school that may or may not put themselves or their children at risk at least schools can say that they followed government guidance. I’ve no doubt schools will be blamed anyway if children start testing positive. Unfortunately, we live in a society where it’s always someone else’s fault.

At my youngest grand-daughters school their bubbles are strictly observed at collection with one-way routes clearly marked. However there were a few Mums who think Covid-19 has gone and were huddled together in chatty groups while their children mixed freely. My daughter said an e-mail has been sent to parents about it.

The furlough scheme did not apply to any public sector employees - only the private sector

Hebdenali, I hope you don't mind but I copied your post and sent it to my daughter who is a secondary school teacher and a primary school mum, she had this to say...

' The whole thing ignores the fact that pupils go home and have siblings who are in other year groups and bubbles. They travel to school together across mixed year groups, then are totally separate at school at great expense to their education and a huge amount of organisation. Then they mix again on their way home and at home. It's nonsense'

When I spoke to my DS who lives and teaches in Spain, he was shocked to hear my DG children who are at primary school in England are in a ‘bubble’ of 30 and are being taught in long rows sitting directly next to their neighbours. He is teaching a half class size with video link to the other half class. Then swop about. The Spanish government have provided extra teachers. They have had 100 extra wash basins put in. When I asked about the money he said the EU is providing it, presumably some of the money we didn’t apply for.

The whole thing ignores the fact that pupils go home and have siblings who are in other year groups and bubbles. They travel to school together across mixed year groups, then are totally separate at school at great expense to their education and a huge amount of organisation. Then they mix again on their way home and at home. It's nonsense'

Many will have siblings at different schools too.
Many will also have to travel on crowded public transport to and from school.

Caro57

"why has this money been wasted"...........because the unions kicked up a stink

Can you explain ?

I keep popping back to this thread but I have to confess I am at a loss to understand exactly what the point of it is.
Everyone wants schools open again.
The government issues guidelines as to how this is to be achieved.
Schools observe this to the best of their ability (no extra money provided no smaller classes and I’d hazard a guess little or no money “saved” during lockdown)
What parents do outside school hours is surely nothing to do with it .

I have a horrible feeling that the bubbles are a waste of time and there only reason we haven’t had COVID yet is that we haven’t been in contact with someone who has it. My DS returned to school this week, two days later the brother of a classmate caught a cold, then passed it to his brother who passed it to DS, out of school the brothers were at the play park with children from several classes. The common cold is a coronavirus too and if it can get passed so quickly and easily with all the distancing and hand washing measures currently in place at school then what chance do we stand against any other bug? I also know of twins split into separate bubbles, which seems crazy as then their parents have contact via the kids to twice as many people!

A few thousand people extra have died from covid; the majority having underlying health issues who may or may not have succumbed to your normal seasonal flu or their own illnesses this year. Some extra people, who have had their cancer or other treatments delayed, may have died earlier because of lockdown. Meanwhile the economy has been ruined.

Sweden decides not to lockdown and has suffered no more deaths per capital than average with no damage done to their economy. The whole thing has been blown out of proportion here and in other countries for some reason, in my opinion, plenty of conspiracy theories about that! Only one person is listed of dying from covid in my area and who knows whether that was genuinely the case. I, personally, don't know anyone who has been ill from it and neither does anyone else I know.

Yes, it's sad if you have been affected by someone you know who has died but they could have died this year anyway. Everyone dies sometime, you just have to get used to that fact, and with over 7 billion on the planet and trees being cut down to accommodate and feed them, no one will survive on this place we call Earth long term unless that number is drastically reduced in the near future. In light of this, worrying about a few kids playing together in the park is ridiculous.

it is far more likely that a child will pick up an infection inside than outside.

Everyone seems to be missing this point.

A few thousand extra people?
I find your post a little heartless