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All eyes are on the Crown Committee meeting today to determine the fate of the current school year, especially regarding the application of blended education (combining urban and online education) in public and private schools.
Yesterday, the Parliamentary Education Commission, in an extended session, took the direction of gradually starting blended education, starting next Monday (January 12), as previously planned, with official diploma classes (Brevet, general secondary and baccalaureate – first section) as the first stage. Classes in public schools and high schools are expected to be divided into two groups, so that the first group will attend in the first week and the second in the second week, provided that 80% of education depends on class attendance and 20% at distance, taking into account that the educational curriculum has been cut in half this year.
According to parliamentary sources, there will be health support for the return to school, in coordination between the Ministries of Education and Health, through an operating room created for the purpose of the Ministry of Education, and there will be representatives of the Ministry of Health in all public schools and private, or “this is at least what was explained theoretically to the participants in the Education Committee session.” The session was attended by the Minister of Education and Health, Tariq Al-Majzoub and Hamad Al-Hassan, representatives of the Crown Committee, the World Health Organization, the Union of Private Educational Institutions, the Union of Teachers of Private Schools and the Associations of Public Education, while the parent committee unions were absent. The session discussed an agreement with the Communications Ministry on Internet rates, but the matter requires a law in the House of Representatives, the sources said.
Al-Majzoub said in a statement that it had received a report from the Health Ministry on its ability to keep pace with the opening of schools on the 12th of this month, pending today’s Corona meeting. “And the academic year will start for high school classes at the beginning.”
However, with the assumption that health care will be fully assured in terms of precautionary measures, social divergence and the application of the health protocol, many obstacles are encountered in public schools that have not been overcome so far, among them the lack of an official textbook in the hands of students in the case of urban education, in addition to the difficulty of securing the supplies. Which is necessary for the school, given that the $ 8.1 million price tag of the platform that went to support public school funding, and which Al-Akhbar knew reached most schools, did not it will be enough for a long time, according to the directors’ sources.
As for “online” education, there is a difficulty in handling the electronic version produced by the Educational Center for Research and Development of the textbook, and the lack of tablets and phones available to students and teachers. To this I add a new debate on which electronic platform the ministry adopts: “microsoft teams” that some teachers have been trained to use, or “class” that the Directorate of Orientation and Orientation distributed yesterday an invitation to a training course for teachers? Has the first been replaced by the second? Is the second free?
On the other hand, the situation in private schools is completely different, since some of them have started distance education since last September 15, and each of these schools has its own electronic platform, and there is no problem of a textbook on paper or electronic, and the private school is only waiting for the official announcement of the return to start blended education. Which will adhere, according to sources from the Union of Private Educational Institutions, and “will take into account social distancing and the ministry’s health protocol, while taking a margin of freedom in urban education, that is, it will not be subject to any detail that the ministry establishes regarding hallway attendance, student division, etc. “
In another note, the Education Committee recommended that the bill presented by the resigned government, which consists of transferring 500,000 million pounds (350,000 million pounds to private schools and 150,000 million to official schools), be included in the agenda of mixed parliamentary commissions.
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