The onus of the government’s plans on reopening schools after the Covid-19 pandemic will lie on the shoulders of the senior school students. As per a report in The Indian Express, the government is planning to send students of Class 9, 10,11,12 first to their schools as they can be banked upon to uphold social distancing measures on their own. To bring about this change, the HRD Ministry is in talks with the NCERT on formulating the set of guidelines whenever they receive a go-ahead from the Union Home Ministry on reopening of schools across the country, the IE report said further.
Suggesting the plans the HRD Ministry has for the return of students up to standard 5 back to schools, the report has suggested that it is unlikely they will return any sooner than 3 months.
It’s very likely that not all students of senior standards will be called to schools at one go. There will be a staggered return for the students in higher standards so that it will allow schools to adapt to new normal of social distancing norms. A class may very well be divided into different batches of 15 or 20 students and the batches will be called into schools on alternate days.
One more marked change on cards will be a non-functional canteen in schools. The school administrations are likely to suggest students bring their lunch from home only. The new norm may also end the moment of recess for the school students as they are likely to be instructed to eat lunch in their respective classrooms which means the old days of mixing up with school mates and their food is all but over, at least in a foreseeable future.
For school administration, they will be asked to install sanitization units at different centers of the school. They will have to ensure all the surfaces which are prone to contamination, must be sanitized before the entry of students every day. School administrations are likely to proscribe morning assembly for some months initially after the reopening along with banning parents to enter into the school campus.
