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Karam Bales Profile picture
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26 Jan, 8 tweets, 3 min read
1/ 🧵 Commons education select committee, stand out statements.

Schools are safe, but students transmitting the virus is a problem
🤷‍♂️
2/ Measures of controls make for safer environments.

He's referring to December.

No masks, no social distancing, classes of 30 with an open window (if there is one) is inheritly safer?

Safer than what?
Naked wrestling in a covid ward?

3/ 2.9m laptops already available?
Anyone know where that figure came from?
If its laptops schools already had then @NickGibbUK should know most of ours are too old and run down to be useful
4/ Applaud the company with Tory links for failing to provide over a third of the laptops required
👏
5/ So it looks like there will be no additional measures, and Gibb seems to think that although most countries can run rotas, we are incapable of organising it

What he means it will impact workers
6/ Which stakeholders are the DfE consulting with?
A panel of pro government academy CEOs and UsForThem?
NEU recovery plan and Independent SAGE urgent report for safer schools have been ignored by government.
7/ No extra funding for extra safety measures.

Biden is investing in improving ventilation, Germany already have.
8/8 So once pressure on hospitals reduces, school will return to December conditions so the hospitals can fill back up again?

Not very promising is it?

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More from @karamballes

Karam Bales Profile picture
24 Jan
1/ 🧵Gaslighting🧵 24/1/21

Dail Mail annoyed a lot of people with its teacher bashing today.
Also misrepresents the unions saying we are telling members not to do live lessons, NEU recently set up a hub where people can share best practice and resources.
2/ Seemed like a large part of the article was designed to make out as if many teachers aren't trying to provide quality education in difficult circumstances.

Also noted the picture shows he's using a premade resource, no issue with the resource but feels like he's over selling
3/ NEU Remote Education Hub
neu.org.uk/remote-educati…
Read 24 tweets
Karam Bales Profile picture
22 Jan
1/ The Education Select Committee meeting this week relied on 4 witnesses depending on limited sources to justify the DfE current policies and they will try to use these to justify not improving safety measures in the future

Full look at the meeting here
2/ Stock phrase answers used in the meeting and regularly repeated in the media

"Teachers at no greater risk than other workers"
"Community transmission"
"No evidence that..."
"Low transmission"
"Appropriate measures in place"
"Balance of risk"

These statements need examining
3/"Teachers at no greater risk"
First of all this ignores support staff and those based in the classroom like TAs do appear to be at greater risk than teachers.

This phrase is a quote from an ONS report done on risk in the workplace, many issues have been raised about the report
Read 28 tweets
Karam Bales Profile picture
19 Jan
1/ Thread: Today @halfon4harlowMP chaired the Education Committee meeting on the science behind schools being included in lockdown.
It was supposed to look at the evidence behind the decision.

Full notes of the meeting are here⬇️
2/ I was worried the moment the witnesses were announced, no epidemiologists, no virologists, just the same people who have consistently claimed transmission in schools is low and there is no greater risk to education workers.

3/I was expecting the same stock answers from a limited range of older studies and a lack of acknowledgement of the incredible difficult and unsustainable conditions we faced in December.

I wasn't disappointed as it opened with the phrase "A balance of risks"
Read 28 tweets
Karam Bales Profile picture
15 Jan
1/ Line up of witnesses by @CommonsEd on the science of school closures is very questionable.

All four have downplayed transmission, risk to workers and stuck to backing up the government narrative that schools are safe.

Where are SAGE and NERVTAG representatives?
#edutwitter
2/ Viner:
Late September he explained away disruption in schools as due to too many children being tested, said this was because they were getting tests for other symptoms.
This wasn't the case still tests for 3 main symptoms and there are concerns around this being too narrow
3/ "Misplaced and unscientific concerns about transmission in schools"

Full article here
amp.theguardian.com/society/2020/s…
Read 11 tweets
Karam Bales Profile picture
14 Jan
1/ The day mass testing in schools was announced I started raising concerns.

The government knew this wasn't an appropriate use and was actually dangerous, we know they'd been warned about this, yet they decided to continue

amp.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan…
2/ SAGE NERVTAG said no
The manufacturer said no
The regulator said no
NHS said no to this as a replacement to isolation
Experts working in testing said no

So why did the DfE say yes?
3/ Original thread here.
This was more PR exercise rather than PH initiative.

DfE prioritised reducing isolation in exchange for increasing the risk of isolation.

Some really twisted logic going on here, whats the thought process going on behind this?
Read 30 tweets
Karam Bales Profile picture
10 Jan
1/ Thread:On request, a quick look at Independent SAGE's A Safe Schools Plan

This is an update on the urgent report on safer schools to take into account the current lockdown

independentsage.org/a-safe-schools…
2/ Due to transmission in schools spreading into communities it was essential for schools to be included in the lockdown in order to protect NHS and save lives.
3/ A National Education Task Group involving all stake holders should be set up to look at the following points
Read 12 tweets

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