Thread: Details of testing in schools is out 😅🤣😂😲🥴🤢🤮

Got to be kidding, as if we needed any more proof the DfE is totally out of touch, this could be the crowning glory.

Unbelievable

Reads more like a PR exercise than a Public Health initiative
tes.com/news/coronavir…
2/ Worth beginning with the press release earlier today, dont worry not much work you just need to use January Inset day to retrain as public health officials.

Note that many support staff won't be in as schools cut their training to save money years ago
3/ Step 1 retrain and retitle staff.

100 tests a day will need 9 staff, 11-13 tests an hour per testing bay, so we either need to spend all day testing or have a lot of bays.

How many staff do they think we have in 10 years into a retention crisis deepened by covid?
4/ Local school with 800 students off, so 72 staff to test them? Even if greater numbers massively increase efficiency what will it be 30-40 staff minimum?
5/ How many bays? 62 to test them in an hour, 31 to take 2 hours, they cant expect us to spend 3 hours a day testing can they?

What about a friends college with 2500 out of 4500 students isolating?

DfE said it wouldn't be much if a logistical challenge, and heads shouldnt worry
6/ Last month we had 500k -800k students off in a week, whats that figure going to be in January if the Christmas impact on already rapidly rising cases is similar to Thanksgiving in the US?
Add in staff and needing 5m tests a week is believable requirement
7/ 20k schools, if community transmission was low, 5 staff per school means 100k staff

Reality if 13 tests can be done per bay we could be looking at ridiculous numbers.
8/ On a side note what happened to the 750k NHS volunteers, or the army of track and trace workers we're paying for?

Shouldn't SERCO or Deloit be doing this for us?
9/ This is why it seems more like a PR exercise. Department for Health must sign off communications, rather than fixing test and trace, getting our moneys worth out of the contract they're going to micromanage our coms?
10/ They know there are going to be ridiculous scenes as we try to implement this so they are pre-emptively blocking stories and pictures making it into the press
11/ Most crowded schools in Europe apparently have space to house whole testing centres, going to be fun in those free schools squeezed into urban areas without even a playing field.

Consequences of previous education policy is really biting during covid
12/ Another PR exercise, so educators have spare time to operate as DfE propoganda merchants?
Monitor social media and use "agreed materials"

Full on authoritarian
Wonder if @toadmeister will be standing up for our freespeech?
13/ I hope the promise to reimburse reasonable costs works out better than previous promises on covid costs. It does appear we need a lot of staff, however should get unemployment figures down.

Anyway SERCO should be paying us.
14/ I guess its another string to our bow, hope the training is better than test and trace call handlers, I wanted who is being paid to create it.

The quality of training is very important for the reliability of test results.
15/ Now this is something we can actually do, no consent then they have to isolate, I assume we won't be told not to send work home like we have for students whose parents previously took them out for safety concerns.
16/ So its antigen LFT tests we will be using. The ones GM stopped using because they were considered unreliable.
17/ And finally, ignore the report in the BMJ that these tests are unreliable, they are bloody great.
18/ Except...
19/ Why the difference?
Oxford trials done by experienced practitioners, Liverpool needed lots of extra staff to administer tests

As I said that 15 mins to 2 hours 20 mins training had better be amazing training.
19/ Why the difference?
Oxford trials carried out by experienced practitioners, Liverpool needed lots of extra staff for testing at that scale.

That quick training session had better be amazing, otherwise those who we would have isolated will be walking around spreading Covid
20/ This policy comes from someone with no understanding of the reality of conditions in schools. Its a great headline but its more PR exercise than an effective public health initiative.
21/ Government is prioritising PR and reducing isolations rather than tackling transmission in schools, and chances are its going to be a lot more expensive.

Such a disappointment, isolating then PCR with pool testing before return would have been more welcomed,if staff provided
22/22 Can't believe what I've just read, I question my sanity, I wonder what the average time heads are going to spend swearing as they read the handbook
23/ Had a fascinating chat with someone who works in testing and knows more than I do, the tests aren't necessarily useless they can be really useful in the right conditions
So exhausted this week covering for isolating colleagues i just realised I put the wrong bloody link in the very first tweet!

And I have no face palm emoji
schoolsweek.co.uk/7-staff-roles-…
A brief summary of what the government has dropped on schools in the last few days of term when many are closing due to staff shortages..#edutwitter #SchoolsScandal #r4today #GMB @LBC
BMJ on 11th December:
bmj.com/content/371/bm…

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More from @karamballes

15 Dec
1/ Thread: Testing in schools! Great, but...

LFT tests were abandoned in Manchester due to having a 50% failure rate.
2/ And LFT are particularly bad at picking up asymptomatic cases, the effectiveness of a policy like this is completely unproven.
3/ The policy is students don't isolate if they agree to daily testing

For seven days!
So gov has moved isolation from 14 to 10 days against WHO recommendations, a move @ReicherStephen said on @lbc wasn't based on reliable evidence, and now students only need 7 days of testing?!
Read 27 tweets
14 Dec
This week schools are going to be a shambles.

Two big outbreaks in my area shuts two schools for the rest of the term.

School in London 65 out of 950 pupils turned up today.
#edutwitter
Heard Havering are telling schools go remote if you want.

Three more schools in my area moving to remote learning for Friday. If this term was one week more the schools would probably all be shut from lack of staff anyway
Two more primary schools in area just sent out letters that they are going remote
Read 4 tweets
13 Dec
1/ I don't think there are any other countries now taking the same approach to schools as the UK.

Most have masks in schools, most have reduced class sizes for social distancing, most have shut already for Christmas, most have access to regular testing
2/ Germany has decided to close schools before Christmas amp.theguardian.com/world/live/202…
3/ "But Sweden"..."learn to live with it".. "GBD"

Sweden schools are shutting early for Christmas to try and prevent whats happened in US over Thanksgiving
thelocal.se/20201211/stock…
Read 19 tweets
12 Dec
@DavidLammy on @lbc asks "Should schools be given a day off to save their Christmas"
I like the guy but he doesn't get it,inset day isn't a day off most schools won't do it and it won't save our Christmas, switch to remote learning next week like Eton have might.
@DavidLammy should be highlighting the letters DfE have sent out telling schools to NOT provide work for students who are taken out of school by parents worried about at risk family members over Christmas

Government care more about attendence figures than education
@lbc
@davidlammy should be apologising that @LabourParty got it wrong on schools, he should be calling out Jenny Harris and all the others who claimed transmission wouldn't occur in schools, proven wrong by Hancock announcement this week.
Read 7 tweets
1 Dec
1/ Short Thread: So I knew government had banned schools from closing early, and removed blended learning as an option, putting all decision making into hands of DfE.

They also banned schools from having inset days at the end of term, which is quite bizarre.
2/ To take away option of inset days seems pretty petty a bit of "we're putting the foot down" posturing.

The determination and effort to keep pushing through that final week despite their own scientist warning it will cause additional deaths is ridiculous.
3/ So was sent this, didn't realise a message had gone out to NOT provide remote learning for students who have the cheek put protecting vulnerable family members above a couple of days in school at the end of term.
Read 10 tweets
22 Nov
1/Thread: Corporate Manslaughter?

Complaints have been made to the UK Statistics Authority regarding misrepresentating data to downplay the risk in education settings.

There does appear to be a propoganda campaign around schools
2/ The government likes to set its own measures of success, initially below 20k deaths was said to be considered a good result. When it quickly became clear this would fail they switched to preventing NHS bed capacity being overwhelmed as their success target.
3/ Looking at how they cleared out hospital beds in Spring, including putting infected patients into care homes, you could argue that meeting their target was more important than preserving life.
Read 23 tweets

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