1,600 school staff off work as Covid outbreaks spread

‘John Swinney and the SQA need to get a grip’ ‘Mitigations just not effective’

NEARLY 1,600 school workers are absent due to Covid-19 as virus infections rocket across the country.

Staff including hundreds of teachers, janitors and dinner ladies are bearing the brunt of the latest outbreaks, figures reveal.

The statistics came as the EIS teaching union called for consideration of ‘blended learning’ – part-time schooling.

It also said it lacked confidence in the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) as it prepares for next year’s exams.

Last night, Scottish Tory education spokesman Jamie Greene said: ‘Everyone in Scotland, from the Scottish Conservatives to the EIS, seems to have a lack of confidence in the SQA.

‘Everyone, that is, except John Swinney and the SNP. We’ve not seen any repercussions for the biggest exam fiasco since devolution. It seems the SNP are happy with this summer’s abject failures of kids across the board, especially pupils who were unlucky enough to live in the wrong postcodes.

‘Parents want to see their children in schools learning under the best possible curriculum. That’s not happening under the current leadership of Scotland’s education system. John Swinney and the SQA need to get a grip.’

Scottish Government figures show there are 1,596 Covid absences in Scottish schools, including 1,001 teachers – the rest are school-based staff such as janitors. These are employees who are self-isolating or have tested positive for Covid.

Ministers previously ringfenced £50million to draft in almost 1,000 extra teachers and 200 additional support staff.

Education chiefs are now considering further measures – including scrapping next year’s exams.

Meanwhile, the EIS voiced ‘grave concern over the rising number of coronavirus cases across Scotland and, in particular, those in schools and educational settings’. It wants ‘clear articulation from the Scottish Government of the triggers that would require local or national school closures, and/or a move to a blended or remote learning model of education’.

It has also demanded ‘contingency planning for staff previously shielding in the context of rising levels of infection’.

The EIS also issued a renewed call for ‘concrete physical distancing measures facilitated through expansion of the school estate and the employment of additional teachers’.

It expressed a ‘lack of confidence in the SQA handling of the 2020 accreditation process and in the current [exams] planning for 2021’.

EIS council member Nicola Fisher said: ‘The Scottish Government decision to reopen schools was predicated on low instances of the virus, so the current mitigations in our schools are just not effective given the current increases in the virus. This has led to the current situation where you can only meet one other household and no one in your own home – but somehow in school classrooms we can have 34 households in a class, with 33 pupils and a teacher.’

A Scottish Government spokesman said: ‘The guidance published ahead of schools re-opening… sets out clearly what health mitigations should be in place. The way the guidance is being implemented in schools is kept under close review, as is any emerging scientific evidence that will help us to protect our school community.’

An spokesman for the SQA said that it ‘continues to engage positively with the EIS and its members’.