All students will be promoted to the next class- Ministry of Education
The Ministry of Education has said that it is not planning on a dead year yet, saying learners will be able to move to the next class before the end of the academic year 2020/2021.
With a number of stakeholders calling upon the government to re-open schools, the Ministry of Education Spokesperson Dennis Mugimba said that there is no cause for alarm, as the ministry has a plan and the situation is under control.
Mugimba made these remarks while appearing on NBS Morning Breeze, Wednesday morning.
“Every learner will move to the next class. We are not planning on a dead year, the P1s will move to P2, the P2s will move to P3. Children of 6 years will join P1,” Mugimba said.
Mugimba said that the Education Ministry has a roadmap in place that will guide the school re-opening depending on the President’s directive on how to safely re-open education institutions that have been locked up since June 18, 2021.
“The roadmap is a living document, we had planned to open in October. Depending on the President's address tonight, we shall tweak the roadmap and roll it out,” Mugimba said.
According to Mugimba, the Education Ministry’s priority is to have learners who have not been to school since March 2020 when the pandemic first hit the country go back first, and have others join them in a staggering manner.
Mugimba called upon teachers to get vaccinated as this is one of the conditions that were set before schools can re-open.
He urged school heads to make sure that their staff is vaccinated because they will be held accountable if the staff is not vaccinated.
The country awaits the final decision on school re-opening among other things from President Museveni who is expected to address the nation on Wednesday, 8:00 pm, in a televised address.
President Museveni in his last address on July 30, 2021, pegged the re-opening of education institutions on vaccination since schools are converging centres of a lot of people, including children, teachers, and parents.
According to the Education Ministry, at least 264,000 teachers have so far been vaccinated with their first dose as the ministry seeks to vaccinate 550,000 teachers by the time of re-opening.
