AMMAN — The
Ministry of Education on Sunday released the “Safe Return to School Guide” for
the 2021/2022 academic year on its website.
اضافة اعلان
The guide was
prepared under the supervision of Najwa Qubeilat, the ministry’s secretary general for
financial and administrative affairs, Nawaf Al-Ajarmeh, the ministry’s secretary general
for educational affairs, and Adel Bilbeisi, the Ministry of Health’s secretary
general for epidemiology and communicable diseases and the official in charge
of the coronavirus file.
Education Ministry spokesperson and Director of Public
Education Ahmad Al-Masafah told
Jordan News over the phone that the
guide was one of the many measures taken by the ministry to return to
face-to-face education.
“The guide was prepared in cooperation with the Ministry of
Health in light of the global developments and experiences related to dealing
with COVID-19 pandemic,” he added.
“It aims to provide human cadres and workers in the
educational sector with practical measures that contribute to providing a
healthy and safe environment for the students,” Masafah said.
According to Masafah, the guide contains back-to-school
scenarios, health requirements that should be met and followed in educational
institutions to prevent the transmission of COVID-19, and the roles of
students, parents, and school employees including teachers, counsellors, and
managers to provide a healthy and safe environment.
The guide states that educational institutions should take
into account health and safety measures including maintaining social distancing;
wearing masks that cover the mouth, nose, and chin; maintaining a 1m space between
teachers and students inside classrooms and 2m in school yards, as well as
providing good ventilation and sufficient hand sanitizers in classrooms.
Other measures include conducting PCR tests for school
workers who are not vaccinated on Sundays and Thursdays of each week, as well
as random rapid tests for students.
The guide says that students who suffer from cancer or
immunodeficiency diseases can attend their classes online but will have to take
exams in person provided that they bring official medical reports from the
Ministry of Health. The same applies to students who test positive and those
whose schools show 10 percent of caseloads.
Despite these measures, teachers
and students have expressed opinions and concerns on getting back to
face-to-face education.
“My fellow teachers and I are
excited to return to school and we cannot wait to see our students after an
absence of nearly a year and a half,” a teacher at a private school in Amman
who preferred to remain anonymous said in a phone interview with Jordan
News.
“We will definitely face some
challenges, including students’ adherence to health and preventive measures.
However, with our passion for our profession we can overcome such challenges,”
she added.
The teacher said that since the
outbreak of COVID-19, students have become accustomed to a certain lifestyle
and developed some “bad” habits such as lack of social activity, laziness, and
the tendency to social isolation.
“We need to get our students back on
the right educational track which is based on cooperative, active, and
student-centred learning.”
Jaber Issa, a 10th grader at a
public school based in Amman, told
Jordan News that he would prefer to
continue learning online.
“If I got to choose, I would stay
at home. It is easier and safer too,” Issa added, “And to be honest, I don’t
think my classmates would abide by the safety measures.”
However, Sarah Ali, a 14-year-old
student, said in an interview with
Jordan News that although getting back to schools is “risky”, students cannot stay at
home any longer.
“We will
wear our masks all the time and keep physical distance. It would absolutely be better
than boring online classes. Besides, I really miss my teachers and friends,”
According
to the guide, the Curriculum and Textbooks Management have planned out an
educational program that aims to compensate for what has been missed during the
online learning process for students from 1st to 11st grade in the
four basic subjects: Arabic, English, science and math.
The program
will launch on August 15th and will last for four weeks from 8am to
1pm.
Read more National
.jpg)
.jpg)
