TG REFLECTS ON PANDEMIC EDUCATION MEASURES

TG welcomes the announcement made today by the Department of Education regarding the closure of all schools, however, it laments the time wasted before being finally hit by a serious wave of the virus, and that not enough consideration has been given to frontline workers.

Whilst many of us have enjoyed a relaxing Christmas break, our frontline workers have been flat out caring for the sick.  Some of them have been required to study in their spare time to qualify to administer the vaccine, when it arrives.

TG is incensed that Government has deemed it appropriate to return this debt of gratitude we owe them by setting up a raft of barriers and obligations for their children's education.  We find it ludicrous that frontline workers now have to seek permission from their Heads of Department, then only send their children when both of the couple's shifts overlap and then teach them the learning set when they return home.

We feel that schools should be open for the children of frontline workers, irrespective of shift patterns and that the teachers should ensure that the children work through the material set for them by their subject/form teachers.  At a time when everyone is making huge sacrifices, none more so than our frontline workers, they need nothing short of our full and unquestioning support.

The party believes that right now, with the current levels of spread and the drama beginning to unfold in our hospital, very little can be done other than paralyse all activity and wait for the storm to subside. The party laments, however, having reached this situation so unprepared, and believes much more could have been done to prevent and prepare for this eventuality, particularly from an Educational point of view. The party notes with sadness the disparity between the standards set in the UK, where online, teacher led learning of the highest standard has been made a legal obligation. This leaves out children at a severe disadvantage with the students they will be competing for university spots with.

In the summer, when contagion levels were close to 0 (even though further waves were expected), the department sat on its laurels and did not implement a serious contingency plan to adapt our education system to a pandemic environment. Prophylactic measures in schools have been close to non-existent, with masks only introduced partially in the last weeks before the Christmas holiday. When it was still possible, no provisions were made to facilitate alternative online learning to reduce numbers in schools. In brief, the department rolled out a substandard response to a pandemic that we were seemingly immune to.  

It is our understanding that most relevant stakeholders (union, Senior Leadership team and Dept of Education) are against the implementation of videoconference classes, and that these reservations stem from the difficult logistics that this mode of learning entails. We understand that at this stage, with contagion out of control, many civil servants sick or isolated, and our healthcare under significant strain, setting up the logistics to enable proper online teaching would be impossible, but we believe the Ministry should be called out for its lack of foresight and management its responsibilities throughout the pandemic. We should have prepared for this inevitable and horrendous second wave by getting our Plan A and Plan B in place as TG has continually urged the government to do since the summer. Instead, we are facing burdening our young generations with an educational deficit they will somehow have to overcome.