School closures

[AstroDan]

BigT, as a teacher myself I take some offence to your earlier comments.

There are 22,000 schools in England alone. Around 30,000 in the UK as a whole. 5,000 is around 16% closed.

The school I work in opened today due to the fact that all except one teacher was able to travel in. The Caretaker was on site from 4.30am clearing paths so the site was accessible. I arrived at 7am. The site, on opening at 8.40am, was barely accessible but we managed. A third of children did not attend today, with many parents choosing to keep children off. The headteacher received some criticism for opening from some, and praise from others.

It should be noted that in a great many schools, senior leaders in a school may live many, many miles away. It is not always possible to have a Caretaker in at 4.30am - and under guidance from local authorities, a school cannot open if it is not safely accessible.

On Friday, the school invited parents to collect children early if they could, but teaching staff and assistants who lived nearby stayed onsite till close.

I am sick of hearing the constant whine of the government and some of the public attacking my profession. 84% of UK schools opened today. And that's due to the commitment of school practitioners across the land.

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[Sam]

Can't we just trust that if a school has decided to open or close, it's because that's what the headteacher honestly believes is in the children's best interest?

 

[BigT]

BigT, as a teacher myself I take some offence to your earlier comments.

There are 22,000 schools in England alone. Around 30,000 in the UK as a whole. 5,000 is around 16% closed.

The school I work in opened today due to the fact that all except one teacher was able to travel in. The Caretaker was on site from 4.30am clearing paths so the site was accessible. I arrived at 7am. The site, on opening at 8.40am, was barely accessible but we managed. A third of children did not attend today, with many parents choosing to keep children off. The headteacher received some criticism for opening from some, and praise from others.

It should be noted that in a great many schools, senior leaders in a school may live many, many miles away. It is not always possible to have a Caretaker in at 4.30am - and under guidance from local authorities, a school cannot open if it is not safely accessible.

On Friday, the school invited parents to collect children early if they could, but teaching staff and assistants who lived nearby stayed onsite till close.

I am sick of hearing the constant whine of the government and some of the public attacking my profession. 84% of UK schools opened today. And that's due to the commitment of school practitioners across the land.

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Like I said I'm not knocking individual schools and normally my daughters is open as well to be fair but what you describe above should be the norm not exception.

It just shocks me when the first thing I hear on the news is 5000 schools shut but not a mention of anything else shut, it doesn't give a good impression of your trade I'm afraid.

 

[TheMan]

I think everyone needs to chip in when we have difficult weather like this not just rely on the council to do it. Its just laziness.

This was exactly my point from earlier, trying to stick up for Astrodan et al. At this point in a community based situation, we help each other, schools that can open with basic staff, parents actually look after their kids and keep them home if possible, and we make sure our elderly are well cared for.

NOT rocket science this, however, the endless attempts by governments etc, to isolate and ostracise areas of the community, creates a situation where it is always "us and them". Just read this thread, and most others! It is everywhere and it is a disgrace.

Someone said exactly the same to me about clearing paths, absolutely ridiculous.

I couldn't give a rats backside about this nonsense, first thing I did was go next door clear their driveway (elderly couple), and then proceed to help a couple of other neighbours with their drive and give the snow to kids building snowmen etc.

5/6 hours solid of it.

This prat of a Prime Minister will tell everyone else what to do, or what they should be doing, or what they do/don't do, whilst segregating just about every area of society, whilst doing the complete opposite himself.

The people in charge should be harbouring a community spirit, yet everywhere, there is divisions being created.

I can't believe people are having a go at teachers for not getting in, or closing, given it so often isn't their choice - and who cares if people post "I HOPE IT'S A SNOW DAY!" - who doesn't work wise?

No common sense, no sense of humour, no sense of community - and each and every person has a part to play in this.

It is time this rubbish stopped.

 

[AstroDan]

BigT - No it doesn't, but that's because of the angle put on it by the media.

84% of schools were open today. They didn't mention that though, did they?

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[Tom]

No offence Dan but your post count just proves how busy teachers are.





100% joking!


-Sent from a mobile phone-

 

[Jonathan]

I just read this interesting article on school closures from the BBC. It's worth a look.

 

[Martin]

I love point 8.

In Germany they stay open when it's too cold, icy and snowy, but close when it gets a bit warm.

 

[BigT]

What the schools in Germany are open during the summer, wow maybe this being in Europe thing might actually be useful.

 

[alee298]

Pah! I had to go to school, even though only 1/3 of the teachers were in and there was a good 2-3 inches of snow!

 

[Islander]

This is a tricky subject. But one thing that annoys me is some of the people on my facebook that are teachers often post updates saying things along the lines of "Hurry up snow I want a day off"
As someone that works and is expected to be in work that annoys me a lot as it just looks like they just want to skive.

Be fair, loads of people from every profession post exactly the same thing every time we get heavy snow

It just shocks me when the first thing I hear on the news is 5000 schools shut but not a mention of anything else shut, it doesn't give a good impression of your trade I'm afraid.

What, 25,000 schools remaining open in the face of such difficult conditions doesn't give a good impression? What utter tripe.

You're lapping up the negative media slant on this - 5000 is a large number when taken completely out of context, but when taken in the context of the number of schools in the UK, it's not huge.

---

There are many reasons why I left the teaching profession - extreme over-working, poor government support, unreasonable targets, prohibitive policies (to name a very small few), but a non-insignificant reason was the frankly abysmal perception of teachers that certain parts of the government and media are trying to force upon the general public; a perception that an alarming number of people are starting to take.

Go to many other countries worldwide, and the work that teachers do is appreciated, and the profession is, and those that take it are, respected. Not so in the UK, where a not-too-small minority see teachers as lazy, worthless good-for-nothings, who work 9am - 3pm, Monday-Friday, 39 weeks of the year. Why would I want to stay in that profession where people think that of me, when I work 7:30am - 6pm Monday-Friday, with another couple of hours in the evening, 5-10 hours most weekends, and continue working throughout Christmas, Easter and all half term holidays, and also on days when the school is closed to pupils because of snow but I've gone in anyway.

Bum deal, no thanks. Sad really, because I love teaching children, and was told by quite a few teachers, and lots of my pupils, that I was really quite good at it

 

[alee298]

I agree with Islander, I respect my teacher while most children are contiuosly rude, mean and horrible to them, my form teacher even admits he finds it extremely sad the children behave in this way and how much stress teacher go through to make sure you have a good education. I despise all those who choose to throw away the education whch millions of other poorer children would love to have.

 

[Islander]

I agree with Islander, I respect my teacher while most children are contiuosly rude, mean and horrible to them, my form teacher even admits he finds it extremely sad the children behave in this way and how much stress teacher go through to make sure you have a good education. I despise all those who choose to throw away the education whch millions of other poorer children would love to have.

That is very true, attitudes towards teachers from students isn't great at the moment, and that certainly needs to be sorted (though that's absolutely no easy feat).

I was talking much more about the attitudes of parents and the general public, however, which is turning more sour the more rubbish is spewed out by the government (who am I kidding... Gove) and the media.

5,000 schools closed? I mean seriously, what about the 25,000 that were bleedin' open?!

 

[delta79]

I was going to reply Monday night to his, but after working a 0530 to 2200 shift i was too tired. I started work before my normal start time to clear snow and grit.

In this shift some of my work was

go out with a driver that had little snow driving experience. To mentor him in snow driving, and if required take over driving the minibus if he could not drive it safety when we reached the first pick up point.

inter site transport of students that were late due to the road conditions

be part of the team keeping the site safe enough for us to stay open.

safety Transport primary school age kids to after school club

make sure our fleet of 6 minibuses was ready to go back out on student transport runs.

To travel to and lock another campus that was not my base site.

and for all this i can only book two hours of paid overtime. the rest of it over my standard 7.5 hours a day is time in leu at 1 to 1 rate. But that the life of support staff.

Yes we had to close friday as we, a team of 5 (included the estate manager) could not keep the site in a safe condition. even though we worked our what its off.

Now lecturing staff, I have been covering locking or unlocking of a campus. teaching starts at 9am, i have had lecturing staff waiting for me to unlock there area at 0630, and had to kick lecturing staff out at 2200 so i can lock the building. their teaching finished at 1630.

In the break in teaching, i have help many of the lecturing staff load their cars with paperwork to do at home. they don't get paid to do work over there allotted hours but they do for the good of the students.

 

[James]

5,000 schools closed? I mean seriously, what about the 25,000 that were bleedin' open?!

Well that's just the media all over. They will only pick out the negative, what will create the most drama. Snow is never as bad as it seems, the media just make it out like the country is collapsing on itself.

If anything the news is a drama/entertainment platform more than anything else, based on over sensationalized aspects of real day life.