China Coronavirus

[Fear Bun Na Sceilpe]

NI had highest ever number of cases today,very unlikely with those timelines that source was schools
There is definitely a political agenda on the schools

I am not sold that there is. If this is rife then schools have a lot of scope to spread it round. Also schools stopped when? Last week?  Don't get me wrong I think less lockdown is the big contributor here (plus look at any other country locally and the numbers are rife so something like new variant or something else must be at play).

I wouldn't want to see schools shut but I don't think it can be ruled out that they are either a factor or could in future be a factor.

Of course there is a political agenda. Just ask any teacher or indeed pupil how many Covid cases they have had in post primary schools, it's crazy. Talking to teacher yesterday and she was telling me out of 64 in her GCSE year all but 15 had confirmed cases since September. If these numbers were in an office workplace it would be closed and everyone working from home. My view is every time we go into lockdown or severe limiting restrictions schools should close.

Honestly that couldn't be farther from the truth , we had over 150 employees positive, no shut down, no action . The schools attributed to 5% of cases in figures released few weeks back by NISRA. I don't believe all these anetodal stories you hear about schools. Undoubtedly some are true but most are bull. Stormont have had plenty of time to help schools prepare for the challenge but as far as i can see it's been another flop . I want my wains at school. Btw I have no idea who will pick up on Childminding hours if we get another extended school closure

[FermGael]

I'm not even sure that all schools are mandating kids with symptoms get tested never mind kids without them. (*case study of 3 schools)

Schools cannot mandate a child with symptoms to get tested

[Smurfy123]

I think Weir has come under that much pressure he will have to close tomorrow

[Wildweasel74]

Unless you work in education, you don't realise how big the problem is through schools. Actual figures are been withheld DE and the EA don't want their staff in, and stay at home but no problem throwing the children and teachers into schools to end up taking Covid home. They are hardly leading by example when they keep there own staff at home, when large numbers refuse to come bck.

[Smurfy123]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

[marty34]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

[Seaney]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

I expect the online learning to be as pathetic as the first lockdown  - throw a few notes to the kids on a Monday and lie back.

[JimStynes]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

I expect the online learning to be as pathetic as the first lockdown  - throw a few notes to the kids on a Monday and lie back.

If that's what you were getting then you seriously need to take it up with the principal of that school or move your children out of the school.

[Milltown Row2]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

I expect the online learning to be as pathetic as the first lockdown  - throw a few notes to the kids on a Monday and lie back.

If that's what you were getting then you seriously need to take it up with the principal of that school or move your children out of the school.

Do you honestly believe this poster has kids? Ffs! WUM

[thewobbler]

https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2020/12/30/what-is-left-to-say/

This article pretty pretty much sums how I feel about COVID.

So much noise. So little consideration.

The past year has seen a ridiculous emphasis on "form" over "pedigree".

It's an awful shame that social media has created a platform for COVID fanatics to incessantly paint non-fanatics as tin-hat wearing imbeciles, and for the actual tin-hat wearers to simultaneously fan these flames.

As mentioned before, the internet should have made us more enlightened. It seems to have has the opposite effect.

[imtommygunn]

Less than 2k up north(1929)... progress I guess...

If these transfer into even 1% hospital cases a day could be big problems in a week or two. I guess in terms of reporting only really two days have been reported since the 22nd so maybe the basically 4K cases we have had over the last few days has been more spread out. Maybe...

Wobbler you only have to read some threads on here to see how some people think they're incredibly enlightened spouting nothing but nonsense with such confidence.

[Seaney]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

I expect the online learning to be as pathetic as the first lockdown  - throw a few notes to the kids on a Monday and lie back.

If that's what you were getting then you seriously need to take it up with the principal of that school or move your children out of the school.

It appears to be across schools, do teachers have to do online live classes, of have they the unions backings not to do so?

[Seaney]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

I expect the online learning to be as pathetic as the first lockdown  - throw a few notes to the kids on a Monday and lie back.

If that's what you were getting then you seriously need to take it up with the principal of that school or move your children out of the school.

Do you honestly believe this poster has kids? Ffs! WUM

Why Milhouse do you think that, do you need specific credentials to be a father - you appear to be one and are a parasite of a human being.

[JimStynes]

So all primary schools off until the 11th
Secondary for the month with the exception of exam kids and frontline
Don't think we have heard the end of the primary kids one. Like has been the case he will come under more pressure to keep closed past the 11th and make a last minute call. Why not just say all primary off until the 25th and start planning. Give himself some space. Remove the midterm

Come on, teachers still need their week off in mid Feb!!

I expect the online learning to be as pathetic as the first lockdown  - throw a few notes to the kids on a Monday and lie back.

If that's what you were getting then you seriously need to take it up with the principal of that school or move your children out of the school.

It appears to be across schools, do teachers have to do online live classes, of have they the unions backings not to do so?

Are you in the North or the South? I don't know of any of the local schools sending a note out on the Monday and that's that. I have done live classes during the first lockdown but there were a lot of issues. The main one was getting everyone online at the same time as some children were sharing devices. The big one for me though is the child protection issues of doing live video chats with primary school age children. I would always insist on a parent being present or somewhere close by. I actually know of one school were a child video a sibling getting changed as a joke. Of course this joke went down very badly with several other parents and I'm sure caused a lot of stress for the family involved. I send YouTube links and video the explanations of the more complicated exercises. Online learning needs to be manageable and realistic. Setting out a 9-3 day of activities is totally unrealistic as no one will do that. It needs to be structured and easy to follow. Hopefully it's not that long this time and children are back in the classroom sooner rather than later.

[armaghniac]

https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2020/12/30/what-is-left-to-say/

This article pretty pretty much sums how I feel about COVID.

So much noise. So little consideration.

This article has some selected points. However, the number of cases, and so eventually hospitalisations, in the UK is 3 times the number when this article was written. This increase occurred despite the restrictions, it would have been much worse without the efforts to dampen things down.

It does reveal something slightly strange, EuroMomo charts don't show any blip in NI in recent weeks, but NISRA data does. Deaths in NI in November 2020 were 16% higher than Nov 2019 and 30% higher than average for November over the last 12 years.

It's an awful shame that social media has created a platform for COVID fanatics to incessantly paint non-fanatics as tin-hat wearing imbeciles, and for the actual tin-hat wearers to simultaneously fan these flames.

As mentioned before, the internet should have made us more enlightened. It seems to have has the opposite effect.

Many of these are tin hat imbeciles, others are downright mé féiners.