“We will not be able to protect everyone in our schools”, alarmed Tuesday, December 28 on franceinfo Guislaine David, spokesperson and co-secretary general of Snuipp-FSU. While the Ministry of Education is considering the possibility of making a second test in the 1st degree compulsory after a proven case of Covid-19 in a class, the teachers’ representative calls for the return of the initial doctrine.
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“A positive case, we close the class for seven days” to prevent children from becoming infected. She also questioned “the ability of parents to be able to take the tests”, because “they can’t find any available slots”.
franceinfo: Several compulsory tests after a proven case in the first degree, does that seem a good idea to you?
Guislaine David: The test, when it is done on D-0, it can be negative, but this does not take into account the incubation period of the disease. We realized in December that children after several days were finally positive even though they had tested negative and had returned to class. So this poses a problem. The question we can ask ourselves when passing two or three tests is the ability of parents to be able to take the tests. Before the holidays, we had this difficulty with parents who could not find time slots available to take the tests. And we were not yet under the Omicron wave. So we can imagine that there, in January, we will not have enough. So, we will certainly create disorder with the parents in order to be able to come back to class.
Do you always ask for the closure of classes after a proven case in a class?
We ask to go back on the rule: a positive case we close the class for seven days and for seven days, we set up distance education and the children do not come back. After 7 days, we can be sure that there was no contamination. We know that we have brewing in our schools. At the time of the canteen where the children are brewing, where the virus can circulate. We have contamination and we have to protect everyone. We know very well that with this wave, we will not be able to protect everyone in our schools.
Are you waiting for details from Jean-Michel Blanquer?
We will have a meeting this week. We are also waiting for details on other protective measures because that will not be enough. It is also necessary to protect the personnel and in particular the vulnerable personnel. We still do not have FFP2 masks or surgical masks in our schools. National Education does not provide us with any. We will also have to plan for the absences of teachers who will be affected by the Covid-19. The Scientific Council announces a third of the teachers absent within three weeks, the minister announced the recruitments of new retirees or contract workers. We know very well that we will not be able to recruit staff for one month, for two months. Recruiting contract workers doesn’t work during this period because people don’t want to come and work for a month during Covid-19. There will be problems with unreplaced absences, so there will be classes that close. Parents must not think that the classes will not close.