Prime minister-PM Robinah Nabbanja will next week interact with the Ministry of Education-moe officials for a definitive date on the reopening of schools by next week.
MOE mouthpiece Dr. Dennis Mugimba, made the revelation on Thursday saying Nabbanja will liaise with a MOE, MOH, and the national task force to ensure that dates and proposals for a new school calendar are drafted.
The new school calendar will be proposed by the stakeholders and forwarded to the president for approval.
This comes after the president met MOE, MOH, and the national task force on Tuesday to discuss proposals for the safe reopening of institutions of learning.
Mugimba, says among the proposals discussed included vaccination of learners and teachers, considering classes that spent lesser time in school, extending learning time to include Saturdays, reviewing the school curriculum to concentrate on core competencies, and strengthening the Covid-19 surveillance system in schools.
Mugimba explained ”We had tentative dates and we hoped it was going to be done within this month, but following our meeting with the president we are waiting for the final calendar to be released next week, or announced to the public next week then we shall share with you,”
He says Museveni wants the gov’t to first consider the elderly above 50 years, teachers, support staff, and learners above 18 years, are vaccinated before schooling resumes.
He explains ‘‘The vulnerable groups are those persons above 50 yrs, their vaccination rate stands at 12 percent, 401.000,the challenge recognized by the meeting is that if you let these learners come back, mingle and go back home , we have a high risk of these learners taking infections back to parents, we have vaccinated about 38 percent of the teachers,209,000 out of 500000 teachers, our target is to hit 100 percent.”
This development comes amidst calls from technocrats and stakeholders in the Education sector to have schools reopened no later than October this year.
Most argue that the continued lockout of learners from institutions of learning will leave a huge dent in the sector in addition to clogged classes.
The secretary-general of the Uganda National Teachers Association,-UNATU Filbert Baguma, asked the government to look at how neighboring countries are handling learners in schools amid Covid-19.
Learners in Kenya, Tanzania, and Rwanda have resumed their studies.
