Once the Health Ministry approves, secondary-level students from forms Two to Six will be returning to face-to-face classes when the next school term begins in January, Minister of Education Priya Manickchand said yesterday.
Manickchand said the students will be expected to return fully to physical all-day classes and that vaccination of the students against COVID-19 is not mandatory. “We can no longer wait on the people who one year later cannot make up your mind,” she said, before stressing that whether students decide to get vaccinated or not, they will not be turned away and that masks and sanitisation stations will be made available.
“If you have not been vaccinated, this is the time to go do it,” she also urged while stressing that the school doors will not be closed to any child.
She emphasised that the students can no longer remain at home and continue schooling because the curriculum is being left uncompleted. The minister acknowledged that using the rotation, shift, and blended learning methods are not producing encouraging results and that a continuation of these practices will not properly prepare children for examinations and movement to the next level.
Additionally, with vaccination available for students ages 12 and up, the Minister said that students who wish to get their vaccines can do so. She reminded that not all First Form students are 12 years old as yet and therefore all the students from that grade would not be able to return to face-to-face classes.
While government has moved to inoculate children 12 years and older against COVID-19, it is yet to acquire the special Pfizer doses for children ages 5 to 11 years old.
Previously, Manickchand had said that the ministry wanted students to become vaccinated to protect themselves while in classrooms. But she maintains that students will not be forced or denied access from learning because they are or are not vaccinated.
Schools have been closed since March 2020 with few exceptions, such as for the sitting of the national and regional exams and preparations for these exams. Then in November 2020 the Ministry allowed the grades 10, 11 and 12 students to return to school for physical classrooms. Then in September of this year the primary and nursery school students returned to school on a rotational basis.
