Falkirk parents given online insight into school return

Organiser Margaret Wilson, who is the chairperson of Falkirk Area Parent Forum, was delighted with the response to the event.

It’s aim was to let parents question the council’s education chiefs about what things will be like for pupils when they are back in the classroom.

And the question and answer session formed the basis of a series FAQs that were published on Falkirk Council’s website on Thursday afternoon.

School return

Margaret said: “We just went through a typical school day and the directors answered questions about what was to happen.

“Robert Naylor and David McKay and other senior leaders were online for an hour and a half, answering questions and all of the feedback I’ve had has been really positive.

“I was absolutely delighted that so many people showed an interest in one of our meetings – it was an increase of 2000 per cent on the last meeting.

“I’m a volunteer and I just advertised it myself through my Facebook page and Twitter so to have 2200 people registered as interested was amazing.”

Margaret’s own recent experience has given her a unique insight into just how complex and challenging the back-to-school journey has been.

For several weeks, she has been involved in the Covid-19 Education Recovery Group, helping to read 14 drafts of the guidance that was finally announced by John Swinney last Thursday.

It involved several late nights, sometimes reading into the early hours, as Margaret works full-time as well being a mum of three, with children at primary and secondary.

She is also chairperson of Victoria Primary’s parent council, Graeme High School’s parent council and is vice-chairperson of the National Parent Forum for Scotland.

“To be honest, it’s been hard work but I’ve enjoyed it. It’s actually been really interesting.

Back to school update

“The people on the recovery group included the unions and COSLA and they were trying to get draft guidance that suited staff, pupils and parents.

“So, that took a number of weeks to get into place while they were also trying to see how the pandemic is behaving.”

At the meeting, Margaret took the national guidance as a starting point for the discussion and felt the directors did their best to say how it would be implemented locally.

She does not underestimate the scale of the challenge – all of the national guidance has since had to be looked at for Falkirk as a whole and then for each individual school, at a time when staff are actually on holiday.

Education chiefs have come under fire from some parents over a lack of information about the return to school but Margaret says there is information out there.

“I get how parents are feeling – there are anxieties, but I think we have to remember that school staff are still officially on holiday.

“Management teams are obviously in schools but because the guidance has changed they are almost having to look again at what level of staff they have all over again.

“In fairness to the senior leaders, they’ve done what they’ve needed to do and they’ve engaged with me and with the meetings that we’ve had,” she said.

She believes that using Zoom was actually a great benefit to parents who often struggle to attend meetings.

“It worked really well and I think we’ll definitely continue to use it because it is challenging for parents to get to meetings.”

The next meeting, via Zoom, will be on Thursday, August 27 at 6.45 pm. Full details will be on Falkirk Area Parent Forum Facebook.

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