RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly says she un­der­stands the fear that some par­ents feel as it re­lates to the full re­open­ing of the school term but she says the Stu­dent Sup­port Ser­vices will be work­ing with such par­ents to en­sure they are com­fort­able.

Since the re­sump­tion of phys­i­cal class­es for Stan­dard Fives and Forms One, Two and Three ear­li­er this month, Gads­by-Dol­ly has been tour­ing schools through­out the coun­try.

These in­clud­ed de­nom­i­na­tion­al and non-gov­ern­men­tal schools.

The min­is­ter said she want­ed to get a first-hand look at how the schools were be­ing run.

She not­ed that ad­just­ments are con­tin­u­ing and by April when all stu­dents get back to phys­i­cal class­es, there should be a con­tin­u­a­tion of COVID-19 pro­to­cols in place.

“The re­turn to phys­i­cal school has been gen­er­al­ly wel­comed by prin­ci­pals, teach­ers, par­ents and stu­dents. Schools have put sys­tems in place to en­sure stu­dents are safe, and they con­tin­ue to ad­just and per­fect their day to day op­er­a­tions to be even more ef­fec­tive and ef­fi­cient,” Gads­by-Dol­ly said.

“There are some par­ents who are still fear­ful about send­ing their chil­dren out; Prin­ci­pals, Teach­ers and the Stu­dent Sup­port Ser­vices con­tin­ue to work with such par­ents, as it is im­por­tant for our chil­dren to come out to the school to cap­i­talise on their best op­tion for ed­u­ca­tion­al suc­cess,” she added.

The min­is­ter said she will con­tin­ue to mon­i­tor the op­er­a­tions of schools close­ly and to of­fer schools as much sup­port as pos­si­ble.

Mean­while, vice pres­i­dent of TTUTA Mar­lon Seales said TTUTA has al­so been vis­it­ing schools and has no­ticed short­ages of clean­ing sup­plies and clean­ing per­son­nel.

“We would like to com­mend mem­bers for go­ing way be­yond the call of du­ty to en­sure the safe­ty of chil­dren. Our Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion re­vealed she had a con­ver­sa­tion with MTS of­fi­cials and clean­ing will be twice dai­ly, clean­ing at re­cess and lunch. We did not see that hap­pen on the ground in some schools. Teach­ers had to step in­to the gap and en­sure their class­rooms are san­i­tized be­tween groups of chil­dren com­ing in­to that space,” Seales said.

He said some schools have been able to clean rig­or­ous­ly but oth­ers had health and safe­ty con­cerns.

He not­ed there is al­so con­fu­sion in the ro­ta­tion sys­tem.

“Many stu­dents are con­fused by the con­stant chang­ing of timeta­bles. Some par­ents are con­fused and can­not make the nec­es­sary arrange­ments for their chil­dren. The teach­ers who are par­ents are al­so hav­ing some dif­fi­cul­ty ar­rang­ing the nec­es­sary su­per­vi­sion for their charges,” Seales added.