PEU is noting the decision by Cabinet not to close all schools

Byafala 07/24/2020

PEU is noting the decision by Cabinet not to close all schools

View pictures in App save up to 80% data.

The Professional Educators’ Union (PEU) notes the decision by Cabinet to partially close schools, amid the spike in COVID-19 infections in the country, which stands just over 400 000 thousand, with fatalities just below six thousand.

It is quite disappointing that the announcement to close schools is only confined to public schools, which painfully reminds us that our country remains painfully divided, thereby perpetually widening the existing inequalities, even after twenty-six years of our democratic dispensation.

We are acutely alive to the fact that the decision was not arrived at easily, considering conflicting and divergent views by various stakeholders in education on the matter.

As we wait for the Minister of Basic education to unpack the announcement into a detailed plan that shall be clearly providing all the nitty-gritties, it is our hope and belief that the move, as taken, has factored in a number of existing challenges in our schools and that it will serve as an enabler to the sector, to reflect and correct most of the impediments that contributed negatively on meaningful teaching and learning since schools reopened in June.

PEU would wish to see provinces utilising the four-week break to attend to the following:

· hire additional teachers to relieve the already overloaded teachers, due to additional classes so created to comply with social distancing.

· to come with plan on how to assist and take on board learners who are sitting at home due to certain underlying conditions.

· intensive consultations with Department of Health to deal with issues of capacity for health workers to cope with number of positive cases at workplaces and subsequent decontamination.

· to regularise implementation of standard operating procedures for containment and measures against COVID-19 at workplaces.

· allocating duties to educators who are supposed to work from home due to underlying conditions.

· tap into and workshop teachers on preparations for online lessons, as an innovation to navigate through the new COVID-19 environment in schools.

View pictures in App save up to 80% data.

We once more wish to thank Cabinet for having applied their minds on our request to have schools closed, as the country is navigating through the highest infections of the pandemic. Whilst we understand that the decision might be serving as a middle ground to accommodate divergent views on the closure of schools, we hope that the advice from medical science and the World Health Organisations on conditions under which schools should operate in considerations of levels of COVID-19 community transmissions served as a yard stick for such a determination and will be used as a template for future adjudication.

We wish to thank all PEU members for being available when needed most, in providing us ,the leadership, with fresh mandate, which enabled us to put across our position, as we compared and exchanged notes with other Teacher Unions.

We also wish to thank our fellow Teacher unions, for the unity of purpose on an issue that affected learners and teachers. Our relentless effort has finally paid dividend, as it finally got the attention of the nation, which ultimately listened. May we continue to remain vigilant, as we endeavour to play our oversight role in ensuring that our education system is always nudged in the right direction.

opera news

opera news

PEU is noting the decision by Cabinet not to close all schools