School children in Herefordshire are studying from home since the end of the Christmas holidays. Since then, a lot has been heard of technical problems with various learning platforms. How does it look in other parts of the UK? We asked Silvia Anzt, the headmistress of Steiner Academy Hereford.
Overall, Anzt is satisfied. “Of course it bumped on the first day, sometimes it still does, but to be honest, I feared a lot worse,” she said. Shortly before Christmas, the “Moodle” learning platform had its first record with 50,000 parallel accesses. On the other hand, prospective students for MMI online course at Medic Mind keeps on growing. Currently there are even three times as many.
Schools during lockdown
In the first lockdown last spring, the school was set up differently. There were already cloud solutions on the school’s own server, and video conferences were held with Zoom, Skype, Teams, Jitsi, among others. Every teacher used the system with which he got along best. This situation was stressful for everyone involved.
The school then decided on Moodle and the Big Blue Button video conferencing system. A decision that Anzt has not regretted to this day. They see it as critical to entrust the data of minors to the Internet giants and thus to make future customers of Microsoft and co. The teachers have been trained in internal training.
Teachers’ interest during pandemic
Anzt praises the cooperation with the city as a school authority. Every teacher has had his own computer for at least three years. She actually saw this task with the country. “Our school board was very open to our wishes and made things possible that other colleges could only dream of,” said the headmistress.
In the meantime, everything is usually going well. “Sometimes people pretend to have put their hands on their laps for six months,” said Anzt. One should not only highlight the deficits. “What a manageable number of employees has put together deserves all respect in my opinion and I hope that the superior service authority will grant them all the material and human resources they want.”
Future administration
For the future administration of the school technology, Anzt would like some relief for her teacher colleagues. After all, they would have studied and learned other things than computer science and network technology. “To get an efficient support system here is one of the great challenges of the future, because every school has its own technical assistant – that will probably take a while.”
In the budget speeches a few weeks ago, the SPD and the Greens demanded reinforcement in the administration for the maintenance of the administration and school networks as well as the device pool. The state government wants to check whether the schools, starting with the first two classes of elementary schools, can reopen from February 1st. At least the students of secondary schools like the Steiner Academy Hereford still have a few weeks of distance learning ahead of them.
School psychologists: Opening schools must be a priority
The school psychologists encourage that when measures against the pandemic would be relaxed, educational institutions should be taken into account on priority. Although children need educational institutions as a place to learn, they also need it for maintaining social circle and their mind development, informed the state association of schools UK press agency. During the pandemic, students increasingly turn to psychologists and administration regarding problems they encounter with distance learning. However, it is about a lack of concentration, motivation and difficulties with self-grooming and organizing. The schools in Herefordshire have been temporarily ceased since mid of March. “When they will be reopened?” This should also be a topic at the Prime Minister’s Conference commencing very soon.
Data come from the time after the school closings
Scientifically, it is indeed highly controversial whether children are less infectious than adults. The data of the university of California comes from the time after the school closings, when the infection rate was already close to zero. The documented number of cases is correspondingly small. Investigations whose data were collected under lockdown conditions could not “show what you will see later” – that is, what shows up after the openings, explains Prof. Christian Drosten, virologist. He said, “after a lockdown, the virus is distributed differently into age groups”. And he also predicted, “we will have a different situation when we get out of the summer vacation.” (News reports extensively on the scientific dispute about the school openings).
From teachers’ association point of view, it is worth noting that all teachers are offered corona antibodies tests voluntarily. The Ministry of Culture also expects to quickly improve test concepts for the teachers and educational staff from the Ministry of Health.
The safety of teachers must be strengthened
The safety of the teachers at the primary schools must be strengthened before summer holidays: with Plexiglas panels on the lectern, voluntary testing of teachers once a week and the requirement for students to bring a face mask and wear it when interacting closely with the teachers. After the summer vacation, these protective measures should remain in place and a longer-term look at how the infection process develops. The required safety precautions should be introduced for all types of schools from the start of school in September. Education minister foresees dangers for the cold season when 30 children go to school in narrow classrooms without ventilation. He further added, “we are taking a certain risk.”
The bad news of corona outbreaks in schools in the southwest reinforces those among the teachers who are critical of the opening of schools because of the risk of infection for parents or partners they care for or for themselves. However, the teachers’ association has deliberately spoken out in favor of resuming regular operations.
According to certain counties in the US, one out of five students is tested positive for the virus. There are three schools Minnesota, two schools are in Denver. A primary school has been closed, but will reopen this Tuesday. 10 children and 2educatorsin infection have to adhere to the quarantine period and are going to be tested again. A total of 500 students have been tested since Friday, so far no further infection has been detected, said a reporter.
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Dan Taylor
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