PETALING JAYA: Despite the surge in Covid-19 infections at school, parents are reluctant to keep their children away from classes.
They prefer a combination of learning from home and attending classes at school, a strategy that even some health experts support.
It is a fine line between keeping the children safe and ensuring that their studies are not interrupted further. For many parents, the almost year-long absence from school has been a nightmare. Children who do not have access to computers and the internet have been significantly left behind.
Parent Action Group for Education (PAGE) chairman Datin Noor Azimah Abdul Rahman told theSun that drastic measures should be taken to address the high infection rate at schools but she said rather than ban
classes altogether, children could take turns attending schools.
“We could switch to the hybrid system proposed by the Education Ministry (MoE) last year,” she said.
Under the hybrid system, children attend school on a rotation basis to ensure social distancing can be more easily observed. However, the system was abandoned and all students returned to classes at the start of the new school year this month.
Since then, there has been a significant surge in the number of infections at schools. As of this week, nearly 5,000 cases and 83 clusters have already been detected. Under the rotational model, students in Forms 5 and 6 were required to attend school daily while those in Forms 1 to 4 would do so on a rotation basis. For primary schools, children from Years 1 to 6 were to take turns attending classes.
Azimah said the surge in infections could have been caused by parents picking up the coronavirus at work and passing it to their children at home.
“Otherwise, it could be patients under investigation or patients under surveillance who continue to send their children to school.”
Also in favour of keeping classes open is former deputy health minister Dr Lee Boon Chye. He said schools could stay open for three days a week to minimise the risk of infections.
Lee also proposed that the MoE set up a committee to monitor educational institutions and provide updates on a daily basis.
“The problem is that headmasters are waiting for instructions, and this can heighten the risk of infections at schools where new cases have been detected,” he said.
He cited poor enforcement or weak adherence to the standard operating procedures (SOP) at schools as causes for the surge.
In defence of schools, National Union of the Teaching Profession secretary-general Harry Tan said SOP have been strictly enforced.
“(Before assigning blame) let’s see if there is any data to show that the source of infections is within the school compound,” he said.
“We do not agree that all schools should be closed. Close only the affected ones.”
The National Parent-Teacher Association (NPTA) suggested that schools be closed temporarily to enable the authorities to address the problem.
NPTA president Datuk Dr Mohd Ali Hassan said the government should act swiftly to find out the root cause of the surge of infections at schools. “We are concerned about the safety of the children. It will have an impact on school attendance,” he said.
