LOCAL BUSINESS WOMAN FACES TRIPLE WHAMMY IN EXAM CANCELLATIONS

Claire Brewerton who runs Wiltshire-based company The Virtual Business Centre, faces a triple whammy with her children – who are all missing their SATs, GCSEs and A Levels this year.

The 47-year-old who lives with her husband Marc and children Grace, 17, Henry aged 15 and Thomas aged ten, has mixed feelings about how they will cope with a changed plan around their education this year. 

 “I think the government have made the right call when they did because it ends a degree of uncertainty which plagued families in our position last year. However it’s not great that this affects all of our children all at once this year.

“Selfishly speaking I was dreading the ‘standing on egg shell’ exam stress time of May and June trying to keep everyone calm, get to school for the right exam at the right time, keep on top of revision time tables and try and keep a balanced positive household,” Claire said.

The latest available home-schooling survey by the Office of National Statistics showed wellbeing of children and parents was being negatively affected by home-schooling. The survey, covering the period April to May last year found: 

*52 per cent of parents with school age children said their children were struggling to complete online learning and of those who were struggling, 77 per cent gave lack of motivation as a reason.

*64 per cent of children aged 16 to 18 believe home education will have a negative impact on their future life plans.

*34 per cent of women questioned said home schooling had negatively affected their wellbeing, compared with 20 per cent of men. Of all parents, 43 per cent said the wellbeing of their children had been negatively affected. 

Claire runs the Virtual Business Centre and has team of 25 who are all working remotely from home until Lockdown 3 ends. She says this makes it particularly difficult to support her youngest son Thomas and adds to her ‘working mummy’ guilt. 

“I’m frustrated for Thomas because I am not cut out to be a teacher whilst also running a seven day a week business supporting home working staff – on occasion I have resorted to paying our daughter Grace to help him do some maths in her free periods and I am not beyond convincing Thomas that Saturday is actually Friday – the joys of groundhog day means I get away with it for a couple of hours before he twigs it’s the weekend!”

Grace, a student at Malmesbury School is studing A levels in Maths, Further Maths and Computer Science and hopes to go to university to study Maths. Henry wants to secure his GCSEs so that he can take up a place at college to study Digital Support Services.

“Grace is more stressed about not having exams than having exams - as she does not really know what is happening or how it’s happening and is worried about her future come September and her university options coupled with virtual university visits. Henry is more relaxed however he does want to work hard to get on to his college course.

“For me I’m also sad that they won’t have those milestones which many children experience such as Prom or Valedictory or a Year 6 celebration which are a rite of passage these days.” 

Claire co-founded her Wiltshire business in 1999 with her husband Marc. The team provide services including telephone answering, intelligent telemarketing, outsourced customer service department, live chat, marketing via text service and email inbox management. Their clients include high end shoe manufacturer Eves & Gray London, Aqueos which offers equine and dog products; Herbs on the Hill offering herb-based natural skin care products. To find out more visit https://www.virtualbusinesscentre.com