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Debate involves a two way exchange of ideas based on knowledge of the subject. Opinion is unimportant if you don't have the knowledge. Facts and experience don't care about opinions. If anyone wishes to explain to me how any secondary school or tertiary organisation is to have a mass testing system in place, from scratch, over Xmas and NY, when the DfE say they are publishing guidance next week, I'm all ears. An explanation based on experience of rolling out mass testing in HE or in Liverpool for example. Not an opinion that teachers should just give up their unpaid holiday and get on with it, whatever "it" is.

Plenty seem very happy sat on the arses taking a state handout whilst the key workers deal with the pandemic. They'll be back to screaming about benefit scroungers soon enough. Typical non-job types.

I get that but when the husband of and aide to a British politician sets up an £100 company and weeks later is awarded a £200m PPE contract it's pretty obvious that corruption and cronyism is front and centre.

Corbyn and his morons would have been worse and I say that as Labour supporter although the point about awarding PPE contracts on merit and not on donations or contacts seems fair.

He'll be blaming the EU and immigrants. The Farage types like that always do.

21 secondary schools where I am plus a city wide 6th form and 2 very big FE colleges. 6th Form & FE is around 7000 students between them, say 1000 students per secondary and that's 28,000 students a week what need testing. That's a hell of a lot of volunteers. And they spring it on us as everyone closes for the holidays. My own kids school have just sent this "Unfortunately, we do not have any details yet regarding when the roll out of the Covid-19 rapid testing may be available in school. Once we have further information we will contact you, as we would need to gain consent before any tests can be performed on site." My wife's Head has just emailed all staff and parents to say that nothing will be in place for the return as he doesn't expect his staff to sacrifice their holiday due to such poor planning by the DfE. I've not even brought home my work laptop, just 150 GCSE mocks to mark but I know we'll have nothing in place for testing when we go back.

I shudder to think how Corbyn's misfits would have coped even compared to the current shower of shit.

I'll also add than no teaching staff are paid for their holidays. They are paid for 267 (IIRC) days which is split, for ease, over 12 months. So again, go fuck yourself.

I worked the Easter holidays, May 1/2 term and 2 weeks of the summer. Our sites haven't shut. Our governing body has insisted we shut and no staff to take any work or their laptops home so kindly fuck off. You explain to me how we are going to recruit, equip with PPE and test kits plus DBS volunteers capable of testing over 6000 students across 4 sites whilst equipping space that doesn't exist, with equipment we don't have over Xmas ready for Jan 4th. Wankers like you have the snark but no fucking clue.

We may skip it then. Long enough day out without detours and the A303 on a summer Saturday.

This isn't about the government, it's about the DfE bringing something in after many schools and colleges have closed and expect it to be in place on the day they re-open. On Wednesday they decide 1st week back is remote, on Thursday evening, after many have closed for the holidays, following DfE instructions of no face to face teaching at all on the Friday (today), the publish details of mas testing in schools and colleges. Everything last minute. Gibbs, the school minister, has just said on Sky News that it will be done by volunteers. How are volunteers to be recruited, trained, DBS'd over Xmas? What happens if there are no volunteers? This could and should have been announced weeks ago so it could have been actioned this side of the hoildays ready for the return.

FE Colleges have thousands of students.

And where do we magic these staff from?

Yeah, right.

Schools and colleges have finished or finish tomorrow lunchtime. My place is closed. Staff are gone. They won't be back until the 4th. We'll be receiving no training as it's Xmas. We'll be getting no kits as it's Xmas. We also have no capacity to test 1000s of students. We have no staff to do it. It's yet another DfE fuck up that could have been avoided.

This is our guidance. We're being expected to set up our own testing regime, from scratch, for the kids going back despite us finishing for the holidays.

https://www.strava.com/routes/2774652912027772028

Miley Cyrus singing rock tunes. Brilliant. Don't @ me, I'm surprised too. Love her country stuff as well come to think of it.

I saw Fontaines DC at a small venue in Manchester a year ago as a warm up gig. I was stood at the back with a beer whilst my then 17yo son went crowd surfing by. Excellent band.

Discovery is just wank now, just fast forwarded through most of the last weeks. The Mandalorian, however, is bloody brilliant still.

Plus all the multi-campus FE and 6th forms.

The remote learning is straightforward enough, we've planned for that and the kids knew that was likely to happen (my kids) and deffo happening (my students). Read the rest. We are now expected to have a test system in place for the 1st day back. We've finished for Xmas. How are we supposed to have a testing system in place for Y11 & 13 at 09.00 on the day of return? How do we train the staff? What staff do we train? When do we train them? Where are the kits? When are they being delivered? It suggests we recruit an army of volunteers to help. How? How do we train them? Are the DBS'd? This should have been decided a couple of weeks ago, not on the day that schools and colleges close for the holidays.

You think black working class lads still had the exact same opportunities as white working class lads and that they've faced no more barriers than you or I professionally? Really? Blimey.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-55348886 On the day many schools and colleges finish. The are beyond inept.

That's part of the problem, we're not aware of it but there is no doubt it exists.