The Education Department has decided to allow students from Classes VI, VII and VIII to also visit their respective schools to meet their teachers for consultations from October 15 onwards, bringing these grades in line with Classes IX-XII, students of which have been allowed to attend since last month.
Protocols will be the same as for the secondary and upper secondary students.
Announcing this after a review meeting today, Education Minister Lahkmen Rymbui said, “This is not for normal classroom teaching but for the purpose of consultation to clear their doubts. We have truncated the syllabus and published the academic calendar so that the students will know what topic to study, and the whole syllabus.”
He informed that the department has sent a letter to the Director of School Education asking him to take feedback from the parents and stakeholders on this issue and the Director has also sent a letter to District School Education Officers (DSEOs) and Sub-Divisional School Education Officers (SDSEOs) to seek feedback from parents, managing committees, including head teachers and teachers, whether schools can be re-opened or not for resuming of normal classes.
“We have given the date to submit the feedbacks on October 13 and October 14, and all the feedback need to reach to the directorate. After that, may be on October 15 or 16, we will finalize our decision whether to resume the normal classroom teaching or not,” Rymbui said.
Meghalaya has around 15,000 schools and, according to the minister, it is not easy for the government to consult all stakeholders, and the DSEOs have to consult and take feedbacks from all stakeholders.
On the Covid-19 situation, Rymbui said that cases are on the rise and it was decided that the SDSEOs will consult with the parents and other stakeholders.
“As 90 percent of the cases are in Shillong, meaning most of the villages in rural areas do not have cases. Therefore covid management committees, headmasters, teachers and parents will decide whether we can reopen the schools or not. We need to involve the village Covid management so that in case any Covid case detected, they will know how to decide which school to close, or house to close. We will decide after getting feedbacks as we from Shillong cannot just take decision without knowing the ground reality,” Rymbui added.
