Secretary for Department of Education, Dr. Uke Kombra today announced that the schools in NCD will remain suspended until next week Monday.
Dr Kombra referred to two circulars that were issued to all the provinces, all institutions and authorities before the National General Elections which gave guidelines to Education Boards and communities in making decisions for schools in relation to elections.
The first one was the Secretary’s Circular Instruction No 5; which specify exactly what schools and teachers should do, prior to the elections, during and after elections.
Then the Secretary’s Circular No 6; basically specified the deferment of school holidays by one week to allow for elections to take place so that schools resume last week. These circulars instructions remain effective as of now.
Secretary Kombra said the circular instructions states that if there are any schools that are affected by violence or by counting approval has been given for the respective provincial education boards to make a decision based on the local situation.
He said, “The violence and the counting issues are happening are in some pockets of the country so if there is necessity the respective provincial education board will be in a better position to make a decision.”
“So we have instructed those schools that do not start last week, teachers have to prepare lessons to come out for the writs or periods at times that students would have missed out in their learning.
“In the case of NCD, we commend officer in the NCD education division, the inspectors, and headmasters and communities at large for starting the school on the 18th last week, Monday.
“They were to continue for the second week yesterday but unfortunately the incident happened that we’re all aware of, on Sunday that has affected every school.
“The safety of students is very important. We must always be concerned of their welfare and safety prior to everything else, so the management, under the department has agreed that based on the request made by the Provincial Education board or District Education board in this case that the classes for NCD will remain suspended until Monday next week,” said the Secretary for Education.