7-DAY JAB BLITZ FOR TEACHERS
Top schools tell PM: We have got 1,500 trained staff ready to give injections at 150 sites across the country from 6am to 10pm. Now all we need is the vaccine
IT IS an audacious plan that a coalition of top private and state schools say could get pupils back into classrooms and prevent the lockdown wreaking lasting damage on a generation of children.
The Mail on Sunday can reveal that four groups representing more than 400 leading state and private schools have offered to vaccinate all of England’s teachers and education staff during a seven-day half-term blitz next month.
Elite fee-paying schools, including Shrewsbury, a £12,000-a-year boarding school in Shropshire, and Woldingham, a Roman Catholic girls’ school in Surrey, have joined forces with dozens of state-funded academies and offered to open a network of 150 vaccination hubs in an extraordinary bid to restart education.
The plan last night won the backing of a string of leading education figures, including Sir Michael Wilshaw, a former chief
‘This is an elegant and very practical solution’
inspector of schools; historian Sir Anthony Seldon, the former master of Wellington College; and former Education Secretary David Blunkett.
Boris Johnson was last night facing calls to step in and approve the plan.
In a letter to Mr Johnson and copied to Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Education Secretary Gavin Williamson, the coalition of schools wrote: ‘Our plan is to establish local “hub” schools dedicated to administering the vaccine to teachers, childcare workers and support staff, starting with nurseries and special schools so that these can remain open over the coming weeks.’
The schools outlined the plan in more detail in another letter to Vaccines Minister Nadhim Zahawi. They proposed vaccinating all of the 453,000 teachers employed in England’s statefunded schools and nurseries, along with 493,000 teaching assistants and support staff, including dinner ladies and caretakers, plus more than 50,000 teachers and other staff employed in the private sector.
Astonishingly, the schools said they could achieve this in seven days during the half-term break.
‘We can establish a network of 150 school sites, ready from mid-February – we would be able to deliver a programme to vaccinate most (or even all) of the 1 million teachers, and childcare workers in England in the week of the February halfterm, while no schooling is taking place,’ the schools wrote. They said the hubs would carry out vaccinations between 6am and 10pm.
The scheme would require 1,500 vaccinators, which the schools would provide from among their medically- trained staff and parents. They would also recruit 2,200 support staff for patient management, cleaning and catering.
‘We are certain that we have more than enough physical space to manage this rollout safely, and we are confident that we could recruit lay volunteers from our own communities to act as support staff.
‘We propose to work in close partnership with local authorities,’ the letter said, adding that it would be ‘an elegant and very practical solution to the problem of ensuring that teachers can be vaccinated, and all schools can fully open, safely and sustainably, as soon as possible’.
The plan has been masterminded by the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference, which represents nearly 300 private schools; Cognita, a group of 40 private schools; the Academy Enterprise Trust, which sponsors 58 state- funded schools; and Ormiston Academies Trust, a network of 40 state schools.
Leo Winkley, headmaster of Shrewsbury School, said it could be one of the vaccination centres. ‘We have offered to act as a vaccination hub to help speed the process of reopening schools safely,’ he wrote on Twitter.
‘School teaching and support staff across the country should be high up the list for vaccinations.’
Elite girls’ schools offering to open as vaccination centres include Woldingham and South Hampstead High School in North London.
The Ormiston trust, whose highest-performing secondary school is Ormiston Venture Academy in Great Yarmouth, said: ‘By standing together our voices are louder and can be heard by many.
‘ It is vital for our children’s futures that our teachers and sup
port staff get vaccinated, so our schools can start to open again.’
Another of the proposed hubs would be at Ipswich School, a private school with annual fees of up to £ 16,300, where vaccinations would be carried out in its Rushmere sports complex.
Tom Hunt, Tory MP for Ipswich and a member of the Education Select Committee, urged the Government to ‘think outside the box’.
He said: ‘This is not a pie-in-thesky idea about how to vaccinate people – this is a proper plan and I think we should be snapping their hands off and saying, “brilliant, how can we make it work?” ’ Mr Hunt raised the proposal with Dr Jenny Harries, England’s Deputy Chief Medical Officer, during a select committee hearing last week. Dr Harries cautioned that ‘the big problem... is the supply of vaccine’.
The schools urged the Government to consider their plan ‘ in the event that vaccine supply is no longer a significant issue by mid-February’.
Former Ofsted head Sir Michael said last night: ‘It’s a good idea. What is absolutely essential is that we get schools back open as soon as possible.’ Sir Anthony added: ‘No 10 and the Department for Education should embrace it enthusiastically.’