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Elementary students will only be able to return to school part-time in the fall if current social distancing and other public health restrictions are established, teachers and school principals warn.
After months of closure, with parents struggling to continue learning at home and children feeling the loss of school, it’s a bleak scene.
But key education stakeholders raise the specter of reopening schools with a small number at any time, and individual students return every half day, day on / off, half week on / half week off or week off / weekly .
The grim picture emerges in separate documents prepared by the Irish National Teachers’ Organization (INTO) and the Catholic Association for Primary School Administration (CPSMA) for contiguity planning discussions around reopening the education system.
Those conversations began for the primary sector, which has 3,200 schools and more than 600,000 students, teachers, and other staff, this week.
The focus for the post-primary sector has been a radical move to calculated grades in lieu of the Leaving Cert, but discussions on arrangements for the reopening of the 730 schools involved will begin next week.
At the primary level, INTO and CPSMA have developed formidable checklists outlining key issues to consider
CPSMA said that in the absence of a Covid-19 vaccine, preparing for the return to school in the fall will be complex, challenging and costly.
He advised that “it may be prudent to prepare for a gradual return and a continuous cycle of attendance, whether by time, day, or weekly, to manage the numbers at a school at any time.”
And, if a complete reopening of the school is not possible, the CPSMA, which represents management in approximately 90 percent of elementary schools, said the Department of Education should develop a coherent and structured distance learning plan for all schools.
INTO has said that its entire membership is “prepared for the challenge of restarting,” but it wants firm assurances that schools will not reopen prematurely and potentially face a second period of closure.
There is a “great concern” among its members about difficulties in maintaining physical distance in a primary / special school setting, compared to stores, factories, and other workplaces.
This is especially the case among younger children, including those starting school and some children with special educational needs.
The union shares CPSMA’s opinion on capacity and warned that “given the current orientation to physical distancing, it will be necessary in almost all schools to reduce the number of children attending at the same time.”
If a school cannot provide a safe environment, INTO said it should remain closed and continue to support students who learn at home.
The two documents address all aspects of life in the country’s primary schools, large and small. They want to take into account before the return of personal hygiene and school cleaning, minimum distances between desks, any need for personal protective equipment (PPE), support for the well-being of students and teachers.
Issues such as personnel who may not be able to return because they are in a vulnerable category should also be considered.
Additional funds will be needed to provide the necessary additional resources and supports in a variety of headings, they said.
Among the prerequisites for reopening requested by CPSMA is a risk assessment at each school that ranges from how many students could be accommodated in each classroom to cleaning procedures, hot water requirements, and hand sanitizers.
The advanced measures required by INTO include a comprehensive testing and contact tracking system, with priority access to teacher testing as part of a community testing program.
Once the school is open, the union proposes a system of self-declaration by staff and parents that, to the best of their knowledge, they, or their children, do not have Covid-19 symptoms, are not in isolation or waiting for the result of a Covid-19 test.
The many concerns raised by CPSMA also include “non-compliant members of the school community” and, in the context of Covid-19, the governing body said they would need clear direction in dealing with unreasonable people, verbal abuse / harassment / assault staff and cough / spit staff.
Post-primary schools serve older students and have different scheduling arrangements, but there will be a significant overlap of problems when their planning begins.
The INTO and CPSMA presentations are based on two-meter social distancing protocols and, if that were facilitated, it could make some differences in the requirements.
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