On the last day of summer term July 2020 the end of year assembly was done remotely it was an online assembly of bubbles. Parents with their children at home, teachers and staff on a working at home day accompanied by their pets and other family members admin staff in an empty office or their garden shed and some class bubbles such as mine that included children of key workers and staff who were able to work on site while the country was in lockdown.
SEN education under the restrictions of Covid had many extra challenges. The students soon learnt to wash hands more frequently and more thoroughly, the young people in our bubble became expert hand-washers. They soon became accustomed to having a pack of stationary and equipment for personal use only, we'd colour coded each pack as a reference system to make sure this students were using thier designated resources. We'd arranged the space and planned activites according to the governments social distancing guidelaines and staff and students had to very little preparation to adapt to this new ways of doing all our activities. The smaller class sizes allowed time and space for more one - to - one interactions. We were able to plan activities tailoured to the specific needs and targets of the individual students in our bubble. We were off timetable so time was managed according to the rythms of the students. Work was begun when they were ready and activities ended naturally and without manic panic clean-ups, work cycles were maintaned allowing students to clean up and look after our space thus developing those all important personal health and social skills. The students have responded well to this free-flow style and benefitted from the extra attention. We've developed a lively social space with lots of chirpy banter, joy and laughter.
On the last day of the school year the staff and students in my bubble assembled in front of the large plasma screen. The assembly began with a slide from the Senior Leadership Team (SLT). They'd created computer generated images of themselves to share at the end of year assembly. 'Guess who that is playing a guitar?' yes, good guess children, that's R an ... who do you think that one is? The one in the middle with long hair and glasses? ... Yes, that's right, that's me. On our side of the screen there was a loud GULP came from me followed by a dash to the door and quick exit. I'd thought I might actually be sick. I then left the building through the Food Tech Room and out for some fresh air. Was that for real? I asked myself picking a sprig of scented rosemary from the neglected raised bed and giving it a good sniff for some sensory rebalance. I calmed myself and returned to the classroom to catch the last of the perfunctory comments saying goodbye to some lucky escapees who'd secured alternative employment. Then came the last slide to wish everyone a happy summer holiday period. That final image was in the same style as the opening one only a whole lot worse. It was a beach scene showing computer generated images of the admin and senior leadership team in their swimwear. The principal was at the centre of the imagely arms and legs flailing as she lay suspended on a jet of water spurting out of a whale's blowhole. In the knowledge that we're invisible to them, we started banging on the tables, kicking out then bits of orange peel, pizza crusts, screwed up balls of paper got lobbed at the screen. The students had already left the assembly and relocated to the outside area. We joined up them and prepared to leave for the summer break, it had been a long and difficult time but we'd been a good team and done our best.
A couple of weeks later, during the blissfull respite that is the summer hols for workers in education, I needed to be in contact with my employer to check if I had a new contract for the year ahead. On opening my mail I read a correspondence from the principal. She'd sent us a link to webpage. The webpage was a list of outdoor activities for children. By way of introduction to the webpage she'd said that as we would be continuing to do as much of our learning with the students outside in the autumn term begining in September that she was forwarding some ideas for our perusal over the summer. The information she shared had a list of recommended outdoor activites for young people and among these were cloudwatching and smelling flowers. Fuck, she gets paid 4-times my salary to sit in an office and share such extremely mundane bullshit. She is full of bullshit, her job is bullshit, off with her head! She's a waste of time and money.
I was offloading this trauma to my sister a couple of days ago. She works at a support centre for autistic adults. The organisation she works for is a charity and employs a fundraiser. This shouldn't be necessary but there's little state support for adult social care and local authority budgets have been cut by half in the last decade. This fundraiser gets paid at least twice as much as the support workers who do the actual hands on work with the young adult service users. Anyway, she came up with a fundraising plan that involved low paid staff standing outside supermarkets with donation buckets in their free time!!
We console ourselves with this work place oppression through laughter and by spending our free time weekends doing activities for pleasure in attempts to regain some dignity and to look after our well-being. We try to distract ourselves and each other from the rage and despair that goes wil low-pay and the blatant pay inequalty that is so systemic. It can't be ignored. It hurts.
