We all know how difficult it has been for school-going children to cope with their studies during almost eleven months of staying at home and not going to school. Despite efforts to introduce various ways of remote learning, through online and especially televised classes, the experiment has pretty much failed because of lack of access to the devices needed. Children from underprivileged families especially and those living in the villages have been most-affected as they did not have adequate access to laptops, computers, TV sets or smartphones. An extensive Education Watch Report 2020-2021 released by the Campaign for Popular Education has revealed the extent of the education gap caused and given recommendations on how to address it.

According to the report, about 69.5 percent of the students did not participate in distance learning and 57.9 percent of them said they could not join the classes due to lack of devices. Over 16 percent who were able to access the classes said they found them to be boring and so they skipped them. Unsurprisingly, most of the students (75 percent) and parents (76 percent) surveyed have said that they want schools to reopen quickly as children are becoming restless and losing out on education.

This seems to be a logical and necessary step at this point when we are confronted with almost a year gap in education for most school-going children. But certain precautions have to be taken before any reopening of schools, researchers have warned. Teachers interviewed have also said that they want classes to resume but safety measures have to be implemented, such as cleaning the classrooms, cleaning bathrooms, providing handwashing facilities and enforcing physical distancing in the classrooms. Other recommendations of the study should also be adopted, including mandatory mask wearing, reopening schools in areas where infection and death rates are low, reopening them in phases, less time for examinations and more time for learning, cutting down holidays to increase class time, reopening certain grades first, and doing away with Primary Education Completion Examination and Junior School Certificate tests, while shortening the SSC and HSC syllabus with fewer subjects.

The survey report has given an invaluable assessment of how education has fared during the last eleven months, what measures failed and why, and also what will help to regain the academic loss. The government should take these recommendations seriously, and provide the funds required to implement the safety measures in the schools that will reopen. As another precautionary measure, vaccines may also be given to the teachers of these schools as soon as they are available.

While there are risks associated with reopening schools, the survey has shown that it is crucial to do so as children are being deprived of education every day they miss school. The key is to ensure that all health guidelines are properly facilitated and enforced.