Well down the page: ‘Jim Thewliss, from teachers’ group School Leaders Scotland says schools did not know the change was coming until it was announced at Holyrood last week and that it had been an enormous logistical task.’
School Leaders Scotland is a pressure group representing head teachers. Mr Thewliss seems remarkably insensitive to the challenges of dealing with a pandemic. The Scottish Government could not make this decision until they saw the data on infection level drops. Schools have two full weeks to plan a small scale return for only some of their pupils as part of phased induction, entirely normal in any organisation that cares about its customers.
The reaction of Thewliss strikes me as just irritable reluctance to do the job is he is well-paid to do. Why can’t he do what so many others are doing to make things work?
Then the claim:
This is counterproductive in relation to the systems we have set up for remote learning and engaging people in their remote learning. This destroys a great deal of that and distracts school leadership teams from doing that to put a cobbled-together process in place for two weeks.
You will be hard-pushed to find anyone within my professional association, even any teacher in Scotland, who thinks this is a good idea.
What’s his evidence? All we have here is one-man’s negativity.
Mind you I can see why he must struggle to do his day job:
Jim Thewliss
General Secretary, represents SLS on:
- ASCL
- Scottish Education Council
- Strategic Board on Teacher Education
- GIRFEC
- National Improvement Framework Professional Associations Group
- SCEL Stakeholder Forum
- SCEL Excellence in Headship
- COSLA Education Policy Sounding Board
- Teacher Workforce Planning Advisory Group
- Head Teacher Recruitment Working Group
- Developing the Young Workforce Chair/Manager meeting
- Scottish Learning Festival Planning Group
- Education Scotland External Reference Group
- Career Pathways National Steering Group
- LGBT Inclusive Education Group
- Commission on Widening Access Implementation Group
- Access Delivery Group
- GTCS Professional Review and Development Group
- Scottish Negotiating Committee for Teachers (SNCT)
- School Library Strategy Group
- 15 – 24 Learner Journey Group
Talking-up Scotland 
SLS? it makes no sense. What authority do head teachers have to call themselves ‘school leaders Scotland’? It’s a very woolly term. What is their remit.
That list is very long, he represents them all? Maybe he has bitten off more than he can chew. With such a big portfolio, maybe he is spreading himself a bit thin. Never a good idea.
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I strongly suggest his CV dispatched to Boris the Terrible
With a strong recommendation that he be appointed to the military post of Joint Chief of Staff
Thereby all the Armed forces can fully prepare for the next Illegal War where no doubt many spoils and riches can be found
But more importantly the ability to leave a fine mess behind
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The ‘leader’ lagging behind. Try and keep up.
The pupils are back at school. The rest on Monday?
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When the school leaders have one of these (or eqivalent) installed in every classroom in Scotland, I’ll start to give their views some respect.
These only cost a few thousand. If I was a head teacher I buy some myself for the school.
Very easily business cased based on greater utility of teacher resource. You don’t need 10 new maths teachers when one can deliver the class session across 10 (or a thousand) classes.
https://www.prometheanworld.com/gb/
We need a 21st century model for education based on high tech.
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He is a busy body
Nobody can be involved usefully in so many positions at once
This story from him will be typical of his approach with all he is involved in
Reject criticise but never come up with better solutions thats his game
Seen people like this throughout life
Theyre all the same
Spout criticism with no expertise in pandemic logistics , fool
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I note the strongly negative reaction here to one individual’s comments. However, for context and balance, its relevant I think to note that the EIS is taking a similarly negative view regarding the return of secondary pupils part-time before Easter – and seemingly not that positive about return of S1-S3 pupils full-time after Easter.
https://www.eis.org.uk/Latest-News/PupilReturn
The Scottish Secondary Teachers Association (SSTA) is more measured in its reaction on the issue of pre-Easter return but still not very positive. From its website:
“The First Minister’s statement has created serious operational problems for schools by trying to accommodate all pupils at some point during the weeks preceding the Easter break.
“The SSTA had been expecting an increase in senior pupils before Easter should there be progress on suppressing the virus. …”
It adds: “The arrangements for pupil return and managing parental expectations has been left to the schools. This will only add to the pressure on teachers trying to meet pupil needs and ensure good parental communication.”
Note that Mr Thewliss claims ” schools did not know the change was coming” whilst the SSTA “had been expecting an increase in senior pupils before Easter”!
Whatever one’s view of the matter – as in many such things there will be trade-offs – Mr Thewliss is not a lone voice expressing concern. Unfortunately, we don’t seem able to find out what discussion if any on this matter took place within the SG’s Education Recovery Group. Both Mr Thewliss and the General Secretary of the EIS are members of this Group.
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‘the EIS is taking a similarly negative view’?
Or just Larry Flanagan?
No sign of even a shoddy members’ survey?
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