When fieldwork is disrupted…. what to do and how to move forward

As anyone embarking on primary research knows, recruiting participants and schools is a difficult business. Daily, the student population was dwindling as children and staff stayed at home through ill health or fear. Some parents were now supervising classes as staff were unable to come into work, and I watched with a sense of helplessness as absences grew. On the 18th March, the Headteacher requested that I leave the school site. Rightly, his priority was to protect the school and prepare for the inevitable lockdown that we all suspected was coming. Just two days later, the Prime Minister ordered that all schools and colleges in the UK close.