We saw on Monday the re-opening of schools in England as reception, year 1 and year 6 students returned to school. From the 15th of June, some year 10 and year 12 students will return in some way to secondary schools. Of course it is a misconception that schools have been closed for the last 10 weeks or so … children of key workers as well as vulnerable children have been allowed to attend and there is staff within each school to provide them with a balanced education whether that be at primary or secondary level as well as safeguarding teams within each school checking on those not attending.
All the time, other teachers have been providing work, guidance and feedback remotely using ever more ingenious methods. Despite what people like Andrew Adonis and Barry Sheerman have said, teachers are working hard for their students and they want to return to the classroom and back to a normal life. In the internet age there is no excuse for not being able to set good quality work for students to access. The ingenuity of many teachers knows no bounds – many are teaching virtually using various platforms such as Teams, Zoom or Hangouts. Quite a lot have gone to the personal expense of buying visualisers or tablets (or cheapskates like me have used a pile of books and their old iPad to get a similar effect) so they can write on a screen visible to a class of children in the same way they would write on a whiteboard in front of the same class of children. No, the argument of Adonis and Sheerman that we are effectively leaving our students up a particular creek without their paddles doesn’t wash and the resentment towards people like this in the teaching profession is growing and is valid.
However, my point in this piece is to discuss the difficult decisions being made by our leaders in Westminster as well as headteachers and parents around the country as to when to open schools and whether to send their sons and daughters back into school.
I know that schools have been planning for weeks for this time. The notion that school children will social distance is for the birds – irrespective of whether they are primary or secondary. What schools are having to do is mitigate for this as well as deal with the complexities of the school timetable – particularly difficult at a secondary level where the timetable is so much more complex. It isn’t as easy as just opening the doors and welcoming students back. There will also be a number of staff who will not be able to return due to underlying health conditions – again this needs to be factored in.
The government says that at all times it is following scientific evidence. The current evidence does suggest that children aren’t at as susceptible to the virus as adults, but they still do not know whether children spread the virus as much as adults can. We simply do not know whether children re-entering school, mixing, travelling to and from school and going back home is going to cause the virus to spread again. For those parents (and maybe some in the teaching unions) who want cast iron guarantees, there will never be one. Every time you step outside your house or even pick up a piece of post pushed through your letter box, you have a chance of catching the virus. You probably have as much chance doing so going to the supermarket than you do by sending your children back to school. There simply is no guarantee whatever.
The argument to get schools open is strong both morally as well as economically. It is a fact that children from more disadvantaged backgrounds will have regressed in their education in comparison to their peers from non-disadvantaged backgrounds but there is a spectrum on both sides of this. Bad parenting exists whether a child is disadvantaged or not. There will be a number of children for which it is easier for their parents to allow them to get up after 12, watch TV or play on the X-Box all day than ensure they follow some semblance of routine and engage with the work being set by their teachers.
Many adults need their children back in school so they can go back to work again – the damage to the national as well as the household economy cannot be underestimated. For many families their secure lifestyle has been shattered by this vile virus. Our economy can’t withstand much more of this and whatever happens we will be paying for the consequences for decades to come.
All of these are compelling arguments for reopening schools as soon as possible. Some would argue that the government are using these as emotional blackmail to force schools to open and parents to send their children back (this would certainly be what some in the teaching unions may say). We must still come back to the “is it safe enough yet” part of the question. For the less divisive parts of the teaching unions, this is the simple question they need answering satisfactorily, still accepting that it will never be totally safe. Unfortunately the more divisive aspects of the teaching unions are using this as a proxy stick to beat a government they don’t believe it over the head with. For some of these people it will never be safe enough even if we wrap everyone up in clingfilm and guarantee we are always more than 2m apart. There are those on the government side of this argument who are relishing this battle with the teaching unions because they get the chance to ‘defeat the blob’ as someone once so eloquently described the teaching unions.
We need to get away from petty arguments on both sides. It will never be totally safe but we also need to ensure the risks are minimised so that the infection rate doesn’t spike again and we get another wave and another – surely the death knell for our economy – lockdown. In the middle of this pettiness on both sides we have the headteachers and teachers working hard to educate those children still not back in school as well as plan for the return of others and the parents who are getting totally mixed messages from both government and teaching unions on the safety issues. Ultimately it will be up to parental choice. Mum or dad knows best. If you are satisfied that your child’s school is safe enough, send them back. If you aren’t sure, leave it a week or two and see what happens. If you aren’t satisfied by the safety at all, don’t let your child come back – but make sure they are still getting adequate home education (schools will still provide the resources and the feedback mechanisms). Always remember that no-one can give you cast iron guarantees, whichever side of the argument they favour. Everything is a balance of probabilities. The likelihood is that you won’t catch the virus and if you do, the symptoms won’t be life threatening, but of course some will and some have and will die from it. Anyone who offers you a guarantee is a charlatan and a liar and their opinions should be dismissed out of hand – these people exist on both sides of this particular fence.
The View from Pengeston 