We must learn key lessons from return to schools in other countries
IT’S the cycling capital of Europe, so it’s easy for the authorities to suggest to parents of children returning to school in the Netherlands in the time of Covid-19 that more of them should take their bike or walk.
That won’t work as easily in many parts of Ireland, but the challenge is the same: how to avoid crowding on public transport as students and workers compete for space on reduced-capacity buses and trains in the autumn.
We don’t know yet what the rules around social distancing will be in September, but the planning around reopening schools is factoring in the need to keep a minimum separation.
That impacts on everything from capacity on school buses and other public transport, to reducing the number of pupils in classrooms, to how many can sit in the canteen at any one time.
Education Minister Joe McHugh is confident the two-metre rule will change. A relaxation to one metre would make the logistics easier, but would still involve part-time attendance by pupils and small class ‘bubbles’, perhaps separated from other groups for the day.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar told the Dáil this week about research showing that if people are more than a metre apart, they are 70pc-80pc protected, and if they are two metres apart, they are 95pc-100pc protected.
Along with distance constraints, schools will have to oversee exacting standards in cleaning and personal hygiene to minimise the risk of infection.
The already-packed daily school routine will have to include regular hand-washing and sanitisation.
Just how much school and hand cleaning is envisaged can be judged by the €24m Mr McHugh says it would cost for the September-Christmas term alone.
Department of Education guidance on what will be required of the reopened school system is expected to be published next Friday, allowing principals and boards of management to get on with their own arrangements.
Discussions are continuing with education stakeholders on the detail, and talks yesterday focused on the policy that institutions will have to draw up to guide their practice.
The policy template will amount to a checklist of what needs to be done and who is responsible for what, as well as setting out protocols, such as around entry and exit, and dropping off and collecting pupils.
They will also be allowed to ask staff and pupils, or their parents, to make a coronavirus self-declaration.
Ireland will be one of the last EU countries to reopen schools, and lessons are being learned from elsewhere in Europe. Schools are back in at least 22 of the 27 member states, generally on the basis of staggered, and controlled, returns, and it looks nothing like it did before the shutdown.
The overall experience has been positive, although with the common challenge of maintaining safe distances and strict cleaning and hygiene standards.
A recent meeting of EU education ministers heard the return had not led to any significant increase in coronavirus infections among children, parents or staff.
No two countries are going about it in exactly the same way. In Ireland, with the largest class sizes in the EU, it becomes more complicated.
In upper secondary schools in Finland, where students are no younger than 16-17, social distances of one to two metres are recommended.
There is no similar recommendation for pre-schools, primary or lower secondary, but they have reconfigured classrooms to reduce the number of pupils in them. Change to school life in Finland also includes taking it in turns to use the canteen.
Although Ireland’s education minister is not keen on masks – the public health advice is that they shouldn’t be used by children under 13 years of age – in France, they play a role in the return-to-school story.
Teachers have to wear them if they cannot observe social distancing, and they are compulsory for early childhood professionals.
While younger pupils are told not to wear masks, they are mandatory for 11-15-yearolds, unless there is a reason they cannot.
Social distancing makes smaller classes the norm, and France has capped numbers at 15, with pupils attending part-time, either every second day, two days out of four, or one week on and one week off, agreed locally.
In current circumstances, parental choice features in the return-to-school narrative.
The decision to reopen schools in England this week was out of tune with the views of many parents; the move backfired badly, with widespread absenteeism.
Schools in Germany were among the first in Europe to start a phased reopening and the approach remains cautious, with a combination of face-to-face classes and distance learning, and strict safety measures in place.
Denmark started reopening primary schools and crèches in April and, because of the way educational facilities are co-located, they had extra space, but post-primary schools are now back and capacity is an issue.
Principals there looked for more guidance on hygiene, arguing they were not health experts and too much responsibility for what they needed to do on that front was left to them.