AIBU No going back to school I’m furious.

What do you actually mean by "political" Joyfulnanna? The unions are speaking up for the interests of staff and pupils, which the government and some of the public really don't seem to care about.

The government seems to have thought that they'd be able to blame the unions, but that appears to have backfired. Most people really aren't that naive and know very well that teachers have been doing their best and will continue to do what they can reasonably do.

Maybe if headteachers had been consulted and involved from the beginning, it would be different. They're the ones who understand the logistics, but they were landed with a load of unrealistic demands, just so the government could look good.

Children need to be at school, they will be the wasted generation. It's a price we have to pay in order for them to have a chance. I have worked and had a family and been free to travel, why should they lose out to protect me? We have to live with this Pandemic, the chances are there will be more, probably more lethal. We will have to learn to live with it and be vigilent but we can't live our lives in the shadows. Let's start putting the youngsters first they deserve it. They will probably get it and not even know.

Come on. Less of the emotive ‘wasted generation’ I nearly inhaled my morning cup of tea laughing.

On a more sobering thought the ‘sacrificed generation’ in this epidemic, if you like such phrases are the old. They have certainly paid the price.

Youngsters do not deserve it any more than any other age group.

Sparkling. Are you advocating a return to school for all children with No safety measures in place ? Just asking.
If you think there should be safety measures have you read Kateks comments about transport for example ?

Summer schools are not the answer,

No, they certainly aren't Furret. We should have affordable summer schools/camps anyway.

I would bet anything you like that the parents who would send their children to summer school would be the ones whose children would benefit least. They would be the ones who normally fill their children's time with all sorts of extra-curricular activities.

Six weeks of unstructured learning will be no compensation for what has been lost. What is really needed is proper investment over the next year or so in initiatives such as Pupil Premium and all the other catch-up programmes, many of which were axed by the current government.

Never mind! It will tick a box and politicians can claim they're doing something. Some of those who have never been inside a school during a school day will believe them.

Where did you pick up the phrase "wasted generation" Sparkling?

Have you thought about the generation of children whose education has been affected over the last ten years? Or are you going to support massive investment to restore what the Conservatives have cut? If you are, I'm all for it.

Sparkling . I have no objection by the way to you voicing your opinion that children should be in school I just want to know how you envisage that working ?

Being involved in workplace safety I believe that schools will have to adopt the same innovation as many business have in bringing their employees back to work.

In the above, shift working, rearranging output techniques, moving storage offsite to create more space for social distancing is just some of the thinking that is allowing companies to create as far as is reasonably possible a safe working environment for staff to return.

As a company, we are solely involved in industrial safety, but I feel that the "can-do attitude" which we have seen embraced by so many employers in various industries must also be adopted within education.

After all, covid-19 will be with us all until a vaccine or cure is brought forward, and that may well be a long way into the future.

One suggestion may well be to extend the day in secondary schools day from 08:00am in the morning until 08:00pm in the evening, and within that have pupils taught in two sessions of six hours.

The above would mean only half the total number of pupils would be on site at any one time creating greater control and room for social distancing.

The above are just my thoughts but it is the kind of solution that many business have adopted so as to reopen. As stated, education needs to adopt the same innovation and "outside the box thinking" if it is to once more get back to anything approaching full functionality.

Absolutely agree Grandad that schools need to (and have been Doing all along) think outside the box. However let’s look at certain practicalities. An 8 a.m. start, 8p.m.mfinish, in terms of school buses ? Particularly in rural areas.
In your average state secondary school you’d be talking of 1000 students in for each part of the day.
School meals ?
Timetabling even with computers is a really lengthy process imagine doing it under those circumstances?
Please don’t misunderstand me I applaud what you are doing and am in favour of a positive approach to the problem but it has to be acknowledged that where schoolchildren are concerned it’s a different set of problems.

Great post Grandad, but it seems teachers themselves would be reluctant to become innovative and rearrange the teaching day, plus their physical workspace, to any huge degree. It would call for enormous changes and a different mindset which teachers would find impossible to adopt.

Maybe now is the time for schools' inspectors to be employed in a more practical way. They could offer advice, as many of them are trained in compliance issues and health and safet. Why not get them quickly on board to visit every school, draw up a plan and help get things underway?

Lucca in regard to your above post-@08:16 today, I would agree that schools engaging in a twelve-hour tuition day would bring forward many ancillary problems.

However, we have been working with many companies in bringing forward Covid-19 safety solutions that have first appeared as "totally radical" and would never have even been considered in *normal times".

The system we have consistently adopted is to seek out a system of working that would enable the workplace to recommence operations (no matter how revolutionary it may seem) and then work and solve all secondary problems around that main system of working.

By example to the above, in regard to the School bus transport, you talk to the company that provides that service so as they change their way of conditioning that transport.

I regard to arranging tuition timetabling etc, then it may be that pupils would attend lessons two days commencing at 8:00am and then three days commenting at 2:00pm.

Obviously, such solutions are not easy to bring about as we have found working with commercial companies. However, what we have also found would be that if the will is there within any company management and their employees all such problems can be overcome.

Its a real challenge isn't it. It's interesting to have your thoughts on a way forward Grandad but I'm not sure about a high school day that finishes at 8pm. By September we'll be heading for darkness by 4pm. I'm not just looking to find difficulties but transport for the young people whose parents don't have cars, or for that group who are classed as vulnerable and haven't been I school for three months anyway are two thoughts that arrived quickly.
Two of our grandchildren have returned to school and nursery. Both parents are key workers, none of the grandparents can do our usual child care, especially risky now the parents and children are leaving the house to mix with others.
For key workers, we have about 5 weeks till the 6 week holidays arrive. It seems there wont be summer schools and so far, local authority and private play schemes that working parents usually book, are non existent. Given the stress on so many young parents of working from home, whilst caring for their children and home schooling them, is it too much to expect that our government would be working hard to support them. (don't answer that..)

Oh yes? Here we have yet another who thinks they can compare the workplace with schools. 5-year olds with adults.

Shift system ??? Mums or dads having to leave work to pick children up? And then what do they do with them?
What storage are you talking about that you want to move off site? And where is offsite school-wise? Desks in the playground? In all weathers?

Output techniques

You haven’t a clue what you’re talking about. And that’s at great post ...really?

For goodness sake Furret, people are only trying to help, there's no point being sanctimonious. If out of all the above suggestions one little idea helps, then that is a positive. Now is exactly the time to be innovative, children adapt far quicker than we give them credit, and actually at least teenagers studying from 2pm - 8pm would suit the morning sleepy heads far better!!
Surely a good teacher could teach in a garden shed and still get good results.

The problem is of course that as usual those who know nothing about education think they can solve the problem. Firstly let's divide the thing into two areas there is childcare which schools have provided and then there is education. It would be comparitively easy to set up childcare provision. To ensure that childcare is also valuable and relevant education is much more difficult. It will not be possible with the current restrictions to provide the same level of care and education children have had in the past. It will impact massively on parents ability to work. The solution cannot be found by any national policy or action. It needs parents, teachers, school staff governors and local councillors to get together and discuss individual schools and find solutions. Can I suggest that all of those proposing to go on a march choose instead to fom a local group, organise Zoom meetings and work out a solution for their school and the children.

Most 4 or 5 year olds are ready for bed by 8pm.

Imagine having children in different schools, different years groups going at different times. Add into that mix a parent (or perhaps two) who works in a different school in the opposite direction.

It would be a logistical nightmare.
Here I Wales there is a 5 mile limit on travel. I know that many pupils live further than 5 miles from their schools and have to use public transport, which gives rise to another problem as the rural bus service does not run at those times.

The school would need to be thoroughly cleansed between shifts too, if Government guidelines are to be followed.

I know you have said that your DGS has been given no work to do and that he has GCSEs now, Grandad and I feel for him and his peer group, but I do think that is not the norm with most schools.

My DGC have all had work to do online which has kept them well occupied. The work has to be sent in and is assessed. They are lucky in that their parents care and can help and I know there are many others who are not so lucky or do not have the IT equipment necessary.

Sparkling, as a retired teacher I find your remark ridiculous:

'Children need to be at school, they will be the wasted generation. It's a price we have to pay in order for them to have a chance.'

Really? Many children miss far more education due to illness. They manage to catch up. The top priority is to protect the public from Covid. Parents, grandparents and staff shouldn't have to 'pay the price'. Children may well be efficient (although asymptomatic) transmitters of the virus.

Look, teachers are great at innovation. We managed to turn a secondary school into an online learning environment with 48 hours’ notice, teaching lessons, offering activities, pastoral care and PE, and in addition accommodated the children of support workers and vulnerable children. Give us enough time and resources, and we could do some of the things suggested. But I don’t see any time or resources coming our way any time soon, and meanwhile, we still have to prepare students for national exams which will be used to determine our competence and the school’s effectiveness. It’s easy for people who don’t work in the sector to have grand schemes (and our politicians are great examples of that), but please listen to what we say when we speak from a position of expertise. I wouldn’t tell Grandad he’s lazy or a stick-in-the-mud if he challenged my big ideas for the logistics industry. I’d appreciate a reciprocal respect.

geekesse Great post. Personally I'd just give Grandad1943 a large secondary school to run for a week with all the restrictions of course, plus a few disruptive pupils and an inadequate school building.

Joyfulnanna

Oopsminty. Makes you wonder if the fear is amongst the parents, more than the teachers. I would be interested to know what your DD thinks about govt's decision to keep schools closed to other year groups until Sept.

Hi Joyfulnanna

I think you're absolutely right about some parents being unwilling to send their little ones back to school.

We were initially surprised at the Years which were invited back in. Of course, there was the getting the parents back work etc etc. But 4/5/6 year olds are still 'babies' and many parents just didn't want them to go back in despite assurances from the Head.

Many parents are reluctant to send tiny tots back. I'd have thought Year 6, 10 and 11 would have been better.

In both my daughter's and daughter-in-law's school the majority of teachers are willing to teach. But they can't teach if the children aren't there!

And what will happen in September? If all the children are back, but in classes of 15, where would the extra teachers and classrooms come from.

No one seems to care about sacrificing the supermarket workers to covid-19; they have been the forgotten, unappreciated ones in all this, it seems.

I think that some death certificates should have shown underlying health reasons or age as the cause of death, with flu just as a subsidiary cause, so the numbers then will not be that much higher than a bad flu year when the world doesn't shut down and no one panics. Younger people do seem to have been affected more this time but I haven't seen any statistics to compare to previous years so this perception could be just be because it's all over the news more, whereas it is not reported usually.

One thing is for sure, everyone who is born will die sometime and everyone knows this. Of course, it's sad when people we personally know and love die, especially earlier than expected but, in reality, the human race is just a Johnny come lately species on an insignificant planet at the edge of one galaxy in a vast universe and is really of no importance in the grand scheme of things.

If you are a believer in a god and an afterlife for those who have lead a good life then you should not be afraid to die. If you are not a believe then just make the best of what you have here and now.

My grandaughter is not going to school, her age group is not allowed yet but if they were her parents won't agree to her going back. I feel that even if the death figures are down to one. It's still too many .
The kids will catch up eventually and so many will have benefited by being with their parents for a long period. In our busy stressed world this is priceless. Those who are taking exams may benefit too , if they have to go a year later to uni I think they will be more mature after seeing our world the way it is now. I just can't help feeling positive in this

It Is Not Flu.

quizqueen So you think that because someone is, say, 80 and healthy, then catches COVID19 and dies as a result, the death certificate should state 'Old Age' as cause of death?

No-one has forgotten the supermarket workers; in fact when I woke up this morning I said a little silent thank you to whoever was packing my grocery order overnight while I slept.

This thread is about the return to school.

While working I have just looked into this thread to see the latest posts. In that, some of the most recent would seem to confirm what several have stated in that the teaching profession appears to be not really interested in seeking solutions to reopening schools fully if it involves any amount of change and inconvenience to themselves.

Furret, in regard to your "rant" @10:09 today, if you care to read thoroughly through the thread you will witness that I have been referring to secondary schools in my above posts.

In regard to child transport etc, for many very parents the days of nine to five working has been long a thing of the past. Just as those parents have adapted to new less social hours, so they would adapt to schools opening to radically changed hours of operating.

As a side note, many commercial companies are now introducing shift working patterns never embraced previously so as to have fewer employees on-site at any one time. Therefore that will bring forward in many households change in the pattern of child transport and care outside of school hours.

Perhaps a radical change in how schools operate may even help families undertake their change of employment circumstance.