‘Shorter summer holiday could aid catch-up’
SHORTENING the school summer holidays remains under consideration in Wales, with a longer Christmas break also a possibility.
The Welsh Government yesterday confirmed that “all options remain on the table” when it comes to catching up and it is actively seeking views on how to meet the needs of learners most affected by school closures during lockdowns.
The idea of shortening the long summer holiday to make up for lost learning after a year of disrupted education has been floated several times by Education Minister Kirsty Williams. And she did so again during a live online Welsh Government question-and-answer session.
Answering questions from members of the public on Wednesday, she said: “Children will need to have a break this summer, and if we were to shorten the summer holidays in any way at all, we would want to make sure that time was reorganised later in the year. We are feeling much more hopeful as the vaccine is coming forward and giving us real hope.”
She also said the concern among scientists about the risk of Covid reemerging in the winter months was also a factor.
“We need to be aware of the fact that our scientists are concerned about what Covid might do in the autumn and the winter,” she said.
“There is a debate to be had about whether we have a slightly shorter summer holiday and then add those weeks on to the Christmas holidays when we think, maybe, we could find ourselves with a bit of a challenging situation again.”
On the subject of extra hours to help with the catch-up, the Education Minister said they had to be careful not to “overload” children.
“We don’t want to get them back, and then overwhelm them with extra, extra lessons. We have to think about what is best for children and making sure it is sustainable for them and having a longer-term plan, not just for this year but further academic years,” she said.
In England, it was announced this week that secondary schools will be asked to consider delivering faceto-face summer schools as part of efforts to help pupils catch up.
An extra £400m in funding has been announced, along with £300m announced for catch-up projects in
January. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the money will help ensure “no child is left behind” due to the pandemic.
Teachers, experts and unions called the money a “good start” – but warned about overwhelming pupils and teachers.
Ms Williams said the topic of shortening the summer holidays was not a new debate, saying: “There has long been a debate in education about whether we organise our academic year in a way that is best for children, and best for learning.
“We do know that that six-week summer period can be really, really challenging and many professionals will tell you about how the first weeks in the autumn term, in a normal year, is about reacquainting with the school and catching up and getting them back to where they were when they left the school at the beginning of the summer. This is not a new phenomenon, nor a new debate.”
There is no date for when all schoolchildren in Wales will return to the classroom, but it is hoped they will all be back after the Easter
holidays. All pupils in England will return to classrooms from March 8 as part of the first step of a roadmap for easing England’s lockdown.
Attempts in Wales to extend the last summer term for a week to help children catch up after months of closure had to be abandoned after an outcry from local education authorities and unions. Most of Wales’ 22 councils told schools they could not open for more time due to staff contracts.
Earlier this week, Eithne Hughes, director of the Association of School and College Leaders Cymru, said she thought the idea of a shorter summer break was “a nonstarter”.
“If we are talking about some sort of summer school and making it mandatory will that be seen by children as punishment?” she said.
“Children have had a really tough time and if we force school on them during summer holidays when many aren’t used to going to school after so long away, how will that work? If this comes at a time when they could travel or visit family or friends, will they become resentful? If a scheme is voluntary who is it going to reach? Will it reach those who are hardest to reach?
“More does not equal better. School should be about quality, not quantity.
“The most important thing about school is to educate. To do that effectively you need to engage, not disengage people.”
MORE than a third of Wales’ adult population has now had their first vaccine against coronavirus as the nation’s rate of vaccination has dropped dramatically.
Over the past two weeks, the number of daily Covid-19 vaccines administered has plummeted by 40%.
The Welsh Government said on February 11 that the vaccination rollout in Wales would slow sharply as a result of a planned UK-wide drop in the number of coronavirus vaccinations produced.
It was anticipated that Wales would receive around 100,000 combined vaccine doses for the week beginning February 15 and a similar number this week.
It is expected that supplies will accelerate again in March, with Wales ready to receive between 160,000 and 190,000 vaccines a week. This will support a change in Wales to focus on administering second doses of the vaccine.
Public Health Wales yesterday published the latest weekly data on the rollout of the vaccine across every part of the country for the week up to February 21.
As at February 21, Wales had administered 908,339 doses in total, up from 793,911 the previous week. Of these, 865,518 were first doses of the vaccine, which is given in two separate jabs. Another 42,821 people had received their second dose, meaning they should now be fully immunised against the virus.
Since February 21, a further 25,000 jabs (first dose) have been administered to take the total to 889,270 or 28.2% of the Welsh population, as of February 24. In that period, there has been a jump in second doses with 69,851 adults in Wales (2.2%) now fully vaccinated.
The detailed figures just published up to February 21 provide a comparison of all Welsh health boards.
Betsi Cadwaladr health board area leads the way in absolute numbers of vaccinations administered, Powys remains the area with the highest rate of vaccinations, as it has done since the start of the roll out, with 36,576 doses per 100,000 population. That’s more than a third of the total population of the health board area.
Cardiff and Vale is lagging behind, having administered 25% of its total population up to February 21.
A breakdown of who has been vaccinated up to February 24, by priority group, shows most categories are at or above 90% completion in terms of getting their first jabs.
The daily data from PHW shows more than 124,000 health care workers have been given their first vaccine doses and over 166,000 people aged 80+ have also got their jabs.
Since moving on to those in their 70s, the vaccination strategy has continued apace with more than nine in 10 having now received their jabs.
Even while the vaccination rollout in Wales slows, Wales has jabbed a third of the adult (16+) population as at Wednesday, February 24. The rate of the rollout has slowed dramatically in the past 14 days although Wales is still just about leading the UK.
In the past 10 days, there has been a massive jump in the number of second doses given out in Wales. So far this week, Wales has administered 27,099 second doses and is leading the home nations in terms of jabs administered per 100,000 population. First Minister Mark Drakeford highlighted how the country was beginning to ramp up the rollout of second doses of the vaccine and said on Wednesday: “Thank you to all of our amazing vaccination teams working hard across Wales to make this happen.”