Education Business 25.5

Expert Panel: Pandemic Recovery

EXPERT PANEL PANDEMIC RECOVERY With Covid-19 still in the community, Education Business gathers the views of a range of experts on how schools can move forwards, to ensure they are as safe as possible for pupils and staff, and to ensure pupils can catch up on lost learning Brian Warren, managing director, Nviro Brian is the managing director of Nviro, a leading provider of cleaning and hygiene services. With a background in the education sector, he is passionate, driven, and caring in aligning staff and customers with a common purpose of providing safe, clean, and hygienic environments in which everyone can thrive.

Andrew Cameron, owner and founder, Intelligent Facility Solutions and To the Pump Sheffield-based businessman, Andrew Cameron, founded Intelligent Hand Dryers in 2012 when he discovered a gap in the market for environmentally-friendly washroom solutions and hand drying in commercial premises and educational institutions. During the pandemic, Andrew and his team launched a new brand, To the Pump, to help organisations reopen their businesses responsibly, efficiently and cost effectively.

Victoria Short, managing director – Randstad Public Services With over 20 years of experience in the Randstad Group, Victoria Short heads up Randstad’s busy public services division. Her expertise lies in leading the way in the growing area of managed service provision and flexible labour resource management.

Chris Smith, head of community, Kajima Community Kajima Community provide lettings solutions to schools across the UK. Their solutions are designed to help venues not only to maximise the income from their facilities but to use the spaces to provide a hub for the local community and support local activity providers. Chris Smith has over 16 years’ experience of the school lettings market as well as previous experience in health and sports development.

36

With coronavirus (COVID-19) still a real threat, schools have re-opened with new safety measures in place. They’ve had the difficult task of balancing risk management while still providing a full educational experience for children and young people.

This is all the more important given that 98 per cent of teachers believe their pupils are behind where they would normally expect them to be, according to a recent NFER report.

While class bubbles are no longer in place, school are still required to minimise the number of contacts that a pupil has during the school day. This is generally done by keeping children in year group ‘bubbles’.

Staggered drop-offs and pick-ups have also been implemented, to reduce the amount of parents on site at one time, as well as one way systems.

“The Department of Education have outlined a set of actions that all schools can take,” comments Victoria Short, managing director at Randstad Public Services.

“Encouraging good respiratory hygiene will be key with the ‘catch it, bin it, kill it’ approach, amongst other hygiene measures.

“Something else to be considered is to have consistent groups or ‘bubbles’ of pupils and teachers. This will help minimise transmissions and also make it quicker and easier to identify who may need to be tested if a case does arise.

“Even though social distancing between pupils may be difficult to achieve, schools can still look to make minor adjustments to support distancing. For example, changing the seating arrangements and only keeping daily use furniture within the classroom to allow more space.”

Hand washing, hygiene and cleaning is central to the safe operation of schools in Covid times, as explained by Andrew Cameron, owner and founder of Intelligent Facility Solutions and To the Pump: “When it comes to official advice on reducing the spread of coronavirus, hygiene is at the very top of the list. WHO recommends regular washing and thoroughly drying the hands using either paper towels or a warm hand dryer, or using alcohol based hand sanitiser to kill any viruses on the hands.

“It’s critical that schools provide sufficient facilities and supplies in order to maintain the required hygiene standards, which means plenty of hand sanitiser stations around

BUSINESS INFORMATION FOR DECISION MAKERS IN PRIMARY AND SECONDARY EDUCATION | www.educationbusinessuk.net