Covid-19 is the biggest health and safety crisis facing school and college leaders. 

Following prime minister Boris Johnson’s announcement and desire to have all primary children back at school from late June, leaders are desperately trying to make sense of what this means for their schools. 

It must be recognised that schools are not closed right now – but have remained open throughout to look after the children of key workers, as well as vulnerable kids.

Staff are doing their best to deal with parent and pupil anxieties, all the while juggling this with their own health and wellbeing. Teachers are providing home-learning activities and staying in touch with their pupils to ensure their safety.

And they all realise the stress and strain on parents as they try to provide home-learning while working at home themselves. Schools want a return to normality – but only when it’s safe for everyone. We were not consulted on the coronavirus plans and have not seen any evidence that this is safe. The 50-page guidance document is very light on detail and leads to even more questions. 

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Do schools have enough teachers in the right year groups, for instance? Many education staff have underlying conditions and are shielding, or are in vulnerable groups or caring for someone who is.

Children have a range of health conditions too, such as asthma. Is there enough soap and are cleaning regimes sufficient? And what about school transport?

The ‘road map’ provides no answers, no signposts and little information on the destination.

Our youngest children are being used as an experiment to see if there is a spike in the infection rate. It’s clear that social distancing of children has been abandoned, but we have not been given scientific evidence to support this.

The National Education Union (NEU) has repeatedly asked to see the peer-reviewed evidence, but it has not been forthcoming. So one is left to conclude that the government wants schools to reopen merely so that they can provide childcare and people can go back to work. 

School leaders will have to carry out risk assessments before deciding that their school is a safe place for young learners and their staff.

The curriculum will undoubtedly change; lots of schools are considering being outside as much as possible, carrying out creative activities and giving children the chance to talk about their fears and worries.

Over 400,000 people have signed the NEU petition requesting that schools only open when it is safe, and many parents are reluctant to send their children back

This could become an Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) for some kids; they may have witnessed domestic abuse, or they may be frightened of catching the virus and bringing it home to their families.

We don’t yet know enough about the role children play in transmitting the virus to adults, but we have the experience of other countries where return to limited schooling has seen greater rates of infection. It is not acceptable for our government to ignore the warning signs.

Children will need support to get used to being in school again, the daily routine will be helpful but they need a chance to deal with a range of emotions. Sadly bereavement counselling will likely also be needed at some schools as education staff have died, and some children and staff will have lost family members. 

School will not be the same as they remember. They may have a limited range of equipment to use, start and finish times may have to be staggered and they may not be in their own classrooms or with their own teacher.

Staff on the other hand will need PPE to keep themselves and their pupils safe, and we already know that this is in short supply.

Over 400,000 people have signed the NEU petition requesting that schools only open when it is safe, and many parents are reluctant to send their children back.

When the government closed schools to all but a few, there were 53 deaths for Covid-19. It seems preposterous to be reopening them while deaths are in the hundreds every day, and infections are still in the thousands.

Until these numbers come down and we have proper testing, tracing and isolation is in place, we simply can’t risk it.

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