How Is The Education Department Of Thailand Planning To Reopen The Schools

Published

3 years ago

October 23, 2021

The Education Department of Thailand is planning to reopen the schools for the students in a two-phase plan while taking strict precautions and measures against Covid-19. The first phase of the plan has already been implemented for the students of the boarding school by creating a safety zone in August. The second phase of the plan will be implemented soon and the assessment for the same has already begun. For the schools to be allowed to Reopen The Schools, the schools are required to pass a Covid-19 assessment.

Requirement Of The Second Phase Of Plan

For passing the evaluation of the second phase, the schools are required to ensure that 85% of the staff and teachers are vaccinated against the virus. In addition to that, the schools are required to fulfil the control measures of Covid-19 as prescribed by the government. It needs to be noted that the government is not forcing any school to restart offline learning. The schools are in full power to decide whether they want to continue online learning or start teaching onsite or whether they would like to implement a combination of both.

If a school is planning to restart onsite learning, it requires to meet additional criteria. For instance, only 25 students will be allowed in a classroom. In addition to that, the students are required to maintain a distance of 1.5 metres from each other. Further, the government is being advised to provide vaccines for the students to improve the vaccination rate amongst the students. Currently, the vaccination rate amongst the students is very low.

Government Starts Vaccination Drive For Students

In the first week of October, the government started rolling out the Covid vaccination for the high school students to stick to the plan of reopening the schools. Currently, more than 3.6 million students have registered themselves to receive the jab and the number of eligible students to receive the vaccination is five million. The government is hopeful that the number of registered students will increase soon and will be good enough to reopen the schools for the student’s safety. Education plays an important role not only in the lives of the students but also that of the government as the qualified students will be the employees or job creators of the future generation. It is, therefore, crucial to ensure that the students still appear for Sarkari Exam and study to qualify for the Sarkari Result with colours and for that smooth running of the education sector is important.

The consent form for the vaccination of the students was available from September 21 and 24. Students who have received the consent started getting the vaccination from 4th October onwards. The vaccine selected for the students is the Pfizer vaccination. The Pfizer vaccination is believed to be more effective than other vaccinations available as it has been created with new mRNA technology. Also, the side effects associated with the Pfizer vaccines are less severe. However, the awareness about the benefits of the vaccination is still not clear to many parents and as a result, not everyone is giving consent to get their children vaccinated.

The Plan Ahead

For most Thai students, the second semester will start in November. Even though the government is planning to restart the schools as safe as possible, the real power to decide upon the same will lie at the hands of the schools and the parents. No student will be forced to return to school if they feel unsafe and the options for online learning will continue. Also, it needs to be noted that the vaccination drive which is being started for the students are totally voluntary and permission for the same will be required by the parents.

The Education Ministry has made wearing masks in the school if reopened compulsory with the need for frequent handwashing. Social distancing is asked to be maintained all the time and further, only cooked food will be allowed. These measures have already been implemented in the first phase and will be extended to the second phase of school reopening.

The Covid-19 pandemic has disrupted the education sector for students from across the globe. What started as vacation was later turned into online classes to ensure that the students do not face substantial loss in their learning. According to reports by UNESCO, the schools of Thailand were shut for more than ten months. Even though online education is helping the students to stay in touch with their books, it is depriving the students of the necessary life skills.