COVID-19:FGN submits guidelines proposals to NASS for schools reopening

           

        

The Federal Government of Nigeria -FGN - has presented the guidelines proposals for the reopening of schools across the nation to the National Assembly.

The Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba made the presentation on Tuesday at a meeting with the Senate Committee on Basic and Secondary Education.

He announced to the lawmakers the ministry’s plans for students to resume across the country.

The FGN had in March closed down schools across the Federation as part of measures to checkmate the spread of the novel coronas virus disease.

At the presentation ,the minister stated, “In the document provided, we have suggested how we can move our education sector forward in this pandemic period."

"We don’t want to make it known at this period so that some people will not take our proposed guidelines for school reopening."He added.

"Even if the Senate has not called us, we would have come to you to discuss with you because we have already discussed with the House of Representatives."

"The documents were presented to you so that you can criticise and make inputs as major stakeholders.”He said

                   

Vice-Chairperson of the Committee, Akon Eyakenyi, who presided over the meeting, expressed their worry over the academic calendar which could be distorted in public schools where no tangible arrangement was being made to teach the children at home, unlike their private school counterparts.

Eyakenyi stated:“Even when the students in the cities have access to education programmes on radio and televisions, what of those in the villages? What do we so that we don’t shut them out?"

"If the government can give guidelines for the reopening of churches and mosques, stakeholders in the education sector could also hold a meeting with the government to agree on guidelines for school reopening.

All we need to do is to come up with measures that would ensure the safety of both the students and their teachers.

" We can design a plan that would ensure that not all the students resume at the same time. We could probably start with the exit classes."she said.

"We could have the number of students that would go to school for both morning and afternoon sessions."

"We have to be innovative in our approach to save our educational sector in this country because nobody knows how long the virus will be with us.”She concluded.