Way forward in opening classrooms

Prof. Pujitha Wickramasinghe gives the following way forward when opening schools:

A very specific and clear message to parents that if their child is ill, he/she should not be sent to school. The child needs to be taken to a hospital/doctor for medical advice.

In classrooms, children should have ample space between each other and this is possible when looking at the student numbers (See below for breakdown). The schools which have large numbers such as 4,000-5,000 students could have the physical presence of children on a rotation basis but online classes for those at home should also be at the same time (simultaneously). This is a hybrid system. Then no child would miss out on his/her lessons and even if the child is ill, the parents would have no problem in keeping the child at home.

Children, except those in primary classes, should be asked to wear face masks, follow hand hygiene scrupulously, keep a distance from others, eat alone as this is the time when the masks come off and not share food and drink. Younger children who tend to take off the face masks should be asked to wear face shields and don the face mask only when travelling to school from home and returning home after school. They too should keep the distance, eat alone and not share their food or drink.

Schoolchildren should be encouraged to wash their hands with normal (not detergent) soap as sanitising could harm the skin of younger children.

All adults around schoolchildren – their parents & family members; principals & teachers; minor & security staff; and van, bus & train drivers – should be vaccinated. These adults too should adhere to preventive measures.

Looking at the ability to ensure distancing between children easily, Prof. Wickramasinghe says there are 10,175 schools with the student population being 4.2 million.

The breakdown is:

5,184 schools have fewer than 200 children (total of 470,451students) 2,660 schools have between 200-500 children (total of 853,728students) 1,390 schools have between 500-1,000 children (total of 962,494 students) 642 schools have between 1,000-2,000 children (total of 880,607 students) 203 schools have between 2,000-3,000 children (total of 490,161 students) 91 schools have between 3,000-4,000 children (total of 312,290 students) 50 schools have more than 4,000 children (total of 245,041 students) Meanwhile, another important point he raises is that in 7,940 schools of the 10,175 schools, a meal is provided to nearly 1.1 million children, while nearly 400,000 children in 932 schools are covered by the milk programme.

“Sadly, when schools are closed, nearly 1.5 million children are deprived of this valuable nutrition,” laments Prof. Wickramasinghe.