Sunday 31st May, 2020 - a day that will long live in my memory as the hardest day of my career, probably my life and I feel it would be useful for me to write this down to process it and share my decision making process. It was a bold call, a brave call and has taken a massive toll on me personally.
Background
We had planned to open our school more widely for the expected year groups (Nursery, Reception, Year 1 and Year 6) on Monday 1st June as requested by the government. We planned, planned and planned again to make the school as safe as we possibly could. We were on risk assessment number 7,892,672 and felt we had thought of everything. We ordered 20 million litres of hand gel and soap (probably a slight over estimation), marked everything up, planned our 2 metres distances, organised lunches and our staggered starts. After speaking to my staff team, the overall feeling was we were happy with our plans, but still did not feel comfortable.
I, naively, believed the government would truly make the decision based on the science and I felt that they would scale back on Thursday 28th May. I sat there shocked hearing Mr Johnson manipulate figures to claim that the five tests have been met and for the government to claim we are still transitioning into COVID alert level 3, but we haven't actually reached that level 3. I also was alarmed to hear that the government were also allowing more family members to meet in groups of six, which completely threw a spanner into the works of my risk assessment. I went to bed feeling uneasy, and little did I know that this would escalate over the coming days.
Making the decision
On Friday 29th May, I went into school with a couple of members of my team to do a final walk through and check all of our plans. We felt OK, but my gut was beginning to tell me something was not right. Furthermore, upon coming home from work on Friday I read the Independent SAGE report. This made me question our risk assessments, and put an even bigger doubt in my mind. This report stated:
1. Reopening schools risks pushing the R rate above 1, and that the model adopted by the government was not even modelled for.
2. A localised test and trace system is the answer, but this has only just been released and needs time to bed in.
3. Modelling of data shows that delaying the opening of schools by two weeks reduces the risk of infection by 50%.
4. Larger class sizes in England make it harder to socially distance, hence comparisons with Denmark are pointless.
Finally, on Saturday morning, I read that four scientists from the SAGE group advising the government have said that they would recommend keeping the lockdown measures in place as the infection rate is very high, at around 8,000 cases per day (as confirmed by the ONS report). We also have the information that we remain at level 4 on the COVID Alert levels, which states that the current social distancing measures and restrictions currently apply.
The Trade Unions for teachers and support staff do not approve of the wider opening of schools and have stated in correspondence that they “remain seriously concerned about the readiness of any school and all schools to open more widely next week”. This is because they do not “feel that there has been a reasonable amount of time for schools to prepare their plans with all staff in the short time since the risk assessment guidance was issued to schools on the 19th May.” This correspondence also advised us that “Trade Unions will communicate with each school opening next week with a view to escalating concerns to the Health and Safety Executive and to the press.”
The Day
After reading all of this information, and adjusting the school’s risk assessments, I felt that I could not guarantee the safety of the children or our staff. I began to frantically communicate with my chair of governors and we discussed in detail my thoughts about the issue. Luckily, I have a great chair, and she fully backed my decision, so I held a whole staff meeting online at 9am on Sunday. I set out my concerns and asked their for their opinions and we came to an unanimous decision to keep the school closed for the additional year groups.
I then began a more detailed discussion via email with my whole governing body. After this discussion, there was a majority view to back my decision and we issued a letter to the parent body at midday to inform them our decision and I donned my tin hat ready to attacked!
Within minutes, an email pinged through and luckily it was a supportive parent, thanking me for this decision and for taking it out of their hands. However, that is where is stopped. We had a number of parents complaining that we have let the children down, that we have caused "untold psychological damage" and how dare I "use independent science and not the government science." I held a Zoom meeting with parents later that day to explain my reasoning, which was also horrific.
I crashed later that evening, exhausted beyond anything I have felt before. My emotional reserves were drained to beyond empty and I began to regret my decision because of the impact it had on me. However, taking my personal feelings out of this, I know deep down that I have made the right decision for the protection of my school community and I would make this same decision again. Ultimately, I hope that I was over cautious and did not need to make this call, and we open widely on the 15th June without my fears being realised, but until I need to make that call I can rest easy knowing I made a hard, but right decision.