Irish Examiner view: Crisis again too good to waste

The reopening of schools can in many ways be seen as a trial run for reopening broader society and specifically consumer-facing businesses.

Ministers met on Thursday to agree a plan for the staggered reopening of schools; different classes are expected to return to their classrooms at two- or three-week intervals. 

The pandemic death toll has crossed the 4,000 threshold when 57 more deaths were reported on Wednesday evening and as the vaccination programme delivers longed-for protection almost as soon as it arrives in this jurisdiction, the focus begins to shift, to look ahead at what might be and when it might be.

The resumption of education and making decisions around exams — nearly any decision at this stage — and all that implies is one of the pressing issues.

Nevertheless, the situation is still so mercurial, so ever-changing that it would be premature to talk about a return to normality — if anyone remembers what that was actually like.

Ministers met on Thursday to agree a plan for the staggered reopening of schools; different classes are expected to return to their classrooms at two- or three-week intervals. 

The Government’s new Living with Covid plan and its framework was also discussed. It is believed details of that revised plan will be released next week. Revising vaccination priorities may also be considered.

A return, or at least trying to return, to full-time first and second-level education will prove a stern test of the lessons official Ireland and everyone else has absorbed from the first year of the pandemic. 

The are many interests, not all of them aligned, about reopening schools and agreeing on a format for exams that can have credibility and treat students fairly and with respect. 

This reopening can in many ways be seen as a trial run for reopening broader society and specifically consumer-facing businesses.

The distress around bringing special needs students back to school, and the life-saving relief that offered to some exhausted parents, also highlighted the vulnerabilities of some of the families in this very difficult, almost unrelenting situation.  

These challenges were exacerbated in too many instances, far too many for a society that imagines itself modern and connected to the wider world, by utterly inadequate, heart-attack-inducing broadband services. 

Too many families were exposed too, as they did not have the hardware — laptops, PCs or whatever — to turn a busy, crowded kitchen into a classroom for three frustrated children and their increasingly frustrated parents. 

Our last national crisis coined that smug phrase: “Too good a crisis to waste.” We are at that point again and we have hopefully learned the lessons the pandemic has offered so far.