Schools in the State resumed Classes I to IX on Monday after a hiatus of three weeks owing to the COVID-19 case surge.
Classes, though, were held till the afternoon and with 50% attendance as had been the case before the closure last month. The stipulations will be in place this entire week ahead of the return of all students for regular school hours, as in pre-COVID times, from February 21.
Classes X to XII have already been resumed till the evening since the past week. From next week, the batch system will be scrapped and schools will resume full swing till the evening, especially as public examinations for SSLC and Plus Two students are just a month-and-a-half away.
At a girls school in the capital city that has classes only from upper primary onwards, the attendance on Monday was around 80% of half the number of students supposed to turn up, say school authorities.
Again, the strength in higher classes was more than that in Classes V or VI where it was around 60%. However, they expect more students to turn up from next week, with only those unwell or the differently-abled staying away from in-person lessons.
At an upper primary school in the coastal belt in the capital where the 50% attendance norm is not applicable owing to the low student strength, more than half the students turned up. This will likely increase over the next few days, especially when regular hours come into force next week for not many parents are able to pick up their wards in afternoon in the current set-up, say the school authorities. Parents are happy to send their wards to school owing to the limitations of online classes, they say.
A prominent aided school in the capital city did not fare better either, with attendance on Monday only around half the total student strength.
Before schools closed again in January, there were a number of students who had not attended school a single day this academic session. Though the government has urged teachers to make a fresh push to get all students back to school, schools are not sure if the results will be any better than that last time.
The government had issued additional guidelines for restarting the classes from Monday. Saturdays, except for public holidays, this month and the next will be working days.
Pre-primary classes, kindergarten and creches too reopened on Monday. Children, however, will attend these only till the afternoon from Monday to Friday a week with 50% attendance.
