What measures are in place/planned in High Schools?

kingfisherblue

My son returns to his SEN college next month. We will receive more information closer to the time, but so far, we have been told that classes will be smaller and cleaning more frequent. There will be one student to each desk, and social distancing will be in place where possible.

The college are considering a separate entrance for SEN students (they are already in a separate building for most of the day). The start and finish times haven't been staggered. Breaks are taken within the SEN building, but lunch is in the main canteen, and we're not sure what is happening with this yet. It would make sense to me if the college stagger the times, especially as some of the SEN students have been shielding due to their medical conditions.

I'm concerned, as my son is in the extremely vulnerable category, but at the same time, I have to consider the bigger picture. Life must go on. We can take precautions, as we do when I take my son out now. Shielding and staying away from everyone for months was having an effect on his mental health. My son - previously someone who loved hugs - knows that he can elbow bump his friends instead. He understands about hygiene, hand washing, and sanitiser. He is ok with social distancing.

I could choose to keep him at home until we have a vaccine, but that may never happen. Instead, we will do what we can to keep risks to a minimum. I'm confident that the staff will do their best to do the same.

superbigal

My son just home from first day at S1.  Happy as Larry.  As am I.

flea72

Staggered school days, lunch breaks, etc.  Class bubbles.  Teachers move around,
 classes, kids stay in one room all day.  On days they have PE, wear PE kit to school and keep on all day.  Masks to be worn indoors.  Windows/doors kept open at all times.  Advised not to use public transport, or school buses

ripplyuk

comeandgo said:

Absolutely fine, let the young get on with their lives, they have had a shxt year.  Scientific evidence suggests young people do not transmit nor have serious side effects.  In the outbreak in Aberdeen non are hospitalised.  

The latest research is showing that children spread the virus far more than adults. This guy mentions two new studies (skip to 3.22) 

https://youtu.be/PPLwG_fT6xQ

Dr_Crypto

It’s been a long time since I set foot in a school but as far as I remember in primary we stayed in one room unless it was something specialist like science. 

In secondary we moved around for all classes. I guess this could be minimised by having students in one room for everything apart from specialist lessons like science? 

But that’ll go out of the window come lunch or break. I don’t see how that can be staggered much in a 1000+ secondary! 

Mrs_Soup

We have been told that our secondary school child will be taught in his form group and form room as much as possible rather than going off into different ability streams for most lessons but that they will have to move for classes which require special rooms eg science.  This will presumably cut down on the number of people moving around in confined spaces between classes.  They are having a staggered end to the day but not a staggered start as all the kids wander in over the period of about an hour anyway.  On days when they have PE they are to go to school in PE kit so they don;t get crammed into the changing rooms and all PE will be outside.  His year group is about 250 in a school of 1500 so contacts will be fairly extensive.  They are not required to wear masks.

Gonna-be-debt-free

Thanks all, that's really interesting.  

So from those responses, there are quite a wide range of measures, from trying to keep them mostly in a single class, through to keeping them in bubbles and wearing masks, but all of them more cautious than our school.  

Ours have brought in a couple of other measures e.g. when getting changed for PE only half the kids are allowed in the changing rooms at a time.  

It seems to be complicating things for the kids having to distance outside of school, but not in school, even when they are with the same groups of people.  I saw the usual 50 or so (well behaved) teenagers waiting to buy their lunch at Greggs, unintentionally causing chaos as other people tried to maintain a socially distance queue around the groups of non-distancing school kids.  Not really the kids fault as it is difficult to take onboard behavior modification that's not consistent.

Dr_Crypto

I guess a certain amount of this is suck it and see. Hopefully there’s some public Health surveillance of different strategies in schools. Kinda wish I’d listened more in those lectures now 🙈