Thread....

Right, this might be an unpopular opinion. But.

I think school should be out for summer. It’s not important right now. What’s important is staying safe. Parents are under pressure.

Teachers are under pressure and as a teacher for twenty years, and also a parent with teenagers, teens are under *serious* pressure. Teachers need to grade their Leaving Certificate Students. And the exams needs to be cancelled. The money saved needs to go to welfare and health

Then teenagers can paint their bedroom or help cooking meals, Zoom with friends, or whatever it is that they need to get through this. And support their families. Not rote learning.

This isn’t a level playing field. Some students have sick parents, some have no access to IT. Some are in Direct Provision centres, hotels with no space. Some are seriously struggling, parents have lost jobs. Some are minding siblings for parents who are front line staff.

Right now they need Netflix, to sit in the garden if they have one, or play Fifa online with friends, read books for pleasure. They cannot be expected to sit in exam halls and try to remember facts that seem bizarre in the face of this

The Department of Education needs to urgently rethink the haphazard decision. Many teachers are at home with their families and trying to manage teaching late in the evening when their kids are in bed. This is not normal. Nothing now is normal

The department need to urgently rethink. The level of Home Schooling before Easter was manic. Everyone was in a crazy spin. The system is flawed at the best of time. But the disadvantage is even wider now.