Two-metre rule will wipe out years of work closing the attainment gap

‘If we went to one-metre social distancing, schools would operate at close to 100 per cent capacity’

By Sir Peter Lampl

The current impasse over getting our schools open is a political crisis that is in danger of becoming a human tragedy.

The vast majority of our nation’s youth has already missed out on three months of schooling, which is in itself close to catastrophic. This will become six months and could become a year or even more unless something changes.

Leaving children at home, handing over their teaching to a mixture of parents and a patchy provision of distance learning, is bad news for almost all children, but especially those from low-income backgrounds.

These are the children for whom every single day with a teacher in a classroom represents a potential golden ticket to a better life, and for whom the lockdown – and the limited reopening of schools dictated by two metre social distancing – represents a massive dent in their life chances.

A UCL study this week found that 20 per cent of pupils (2million) still do less than one hour of schoolwork a day at home, or none at all, while many private school students are doing six hours. The fact is that poorer households are less likely to have the time, space or internet provision to support their children’s education.

Indeed, the Education Endowment Foundation, which I chair, has estimated that 10 years of progress on closing the attainment gap between the poorest children and their wealthier classmates will be reversed as a result of school closures.

As things stand, heads teachers are attempting to reopen their schools with their hands tied behind their backs. As much as education ministers and the Prime Minister want them to throw open their gates and fill their classrooms with students hungry to learn, it is currently impossible.

This is because the two-metre social distancing policy means most schools can never be operated at more than 50 per cent capacity (at most). Head teachers simply don’t have the classrooms or the teachers to run a full – or even close to full – timetable with classes of 15 students, which is what the two-metre rule allows.

Of course, schools can put in place a system of rotas, but it would still mean 50 per cent of children at home for 50 per cent of the time. This would be catastrophic for both their education and for getting their parents back to full-time work – something that must happen urgently if we are going to get the economy back on track.

Taking the two-metre rule down to one metre would transform this picture. One-metre social distancing is recommended by the World Health Organisation, an organisation responsible for international public health and which has $4.2billion in revenues and 150 field offices, and it is also the policy of many countries, a high proportion of which have excellent records of dealing with Covid-19 and opening up their schools.

If we went to one-metre social distancing, schools would operate at 100 per cent, or close to 100 per cent, capacity.

Such a change to the regulations, which is currently being considered in Government, would make a massive difference for schools, for working parents and for the economy.

This would mean that our overall level of education will not suffer and it would be a magic bullet for the educational prospects of our poorest children.

I’ve spent the past 20 years working to improve social mobility and on transforming the life chances for young people. We cannot allow this virus to deflect us from this most important agenda.

There is no time to waste: schools and their students need change now.