Schools Already Sending Children Home and Switching to ‘Remote Learning’

Schools have begun moving to remote lessons for the final week of term in spite of Downing Street saying children should remain in the classroom unless it is a “public health emergency”. Camilla Turner in the Telegraph has more.

Headteachers are drawing up lists of key workers’ children and updating plans for remote learning in January in case schools are told not to reopen following the Christmas break.

Unions warned on Monday night that omicron is causing “chaos” in schools and called for the return of pupils next term to be staggered.

Schools around the country have told parents to keep their children at home for the final week of term amid rising “panic” about the latest Covid variant.

Two schools in Bury St Edmunds – Sybil Andrews Academy and Abbots Green Academy – told pupils to learn remotely this week following three suspected cases of omicron.

The schools said in a joint statement that their “intention” is that the closures “salvage Christmas” as well as safeguard the “health and wellbeing of our school communities”.

Abingdon and Witney College in Oxfordshire told the majority of its pupils to stay at home and learn online this week as a “proactive measure” in the “run-up to Christmas”.

The school did not mention any confirmed or suspected Covid cases in its explanation for closing but said it wanted to “ensure that we keep ourselves and our families as safe as possible over the festive period”.

Hull City Council wrote to parents at St Mary’s College to say that Year 9 pupils should stay at home for the rest of the term because “a very small number of cases have shown an indicator on the PCR sample which is often, although not always, linked to the omicron variant”.

The council’s director of public health said that further tests will be done to confirm the variant but they take a few days, adding: “With Christmas approaching and a rising number of cases we want to stop the opportunity for further spread as quickly as possible.”

Arabella Skinner, a director of the parent campaign group UsForThem, said that the Government’s “confused” guidance means that children are being “penalised” by missing time in the classroom.

She said: “The Department for Education needs to get a grip on making sure that face-to-face education is a priority.

“It sounds like these panicked responses from local public health officials are not proportionate and are not putting children first.”

Worth reading in full.