Education sector to receive vaccinations before schools re-open

The Education Ministry has requested the Health Ministry to allocate vaccines for principals, teachers, non-academic staff and a section of students before schools re-open for the next term.

Under the plan the Ministry first requested for vaccines to be made available for nearly 300,000 principals, teachers and selected non–academic staff, Education Ministry Secretary Kapila Perera told the Education Times recently.

Thereafter students due to sit the GCE A/L and O/L exams this year were to be vaccinated next. Estimates show that nearly 425,000 students due to sit the A/L exams and another 350,000 students due to sit the O/L exams this year need to be vaccinated.

Prof. Perera said the request for the vaccinations have gone out already and they are expecting to start the vaccination programme this month with the hope of re-opening schools next month.

However under the proposed plan, students will be brought back on a staggered basis with the A/L and O/ L students first, followed by students between grade six and grade 13 and then finally the primary level students.

The decision was made after teacher unions too demanded that priority should be given to school teachers as they too were a vulnerable group.

They pointed out that measures need to be taken to resume schools as students have been deprived of a proper education for the past one and a half years, due to COVID-19.

They also said the online education system has failed to achieve its objectives overall, even though it has helped some students in certain urban areas.