The South African Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu) has expressed concern that the government’s mass home visit Covid-19 screening might not cover all pupils before the reopening of the schools.
President Cyril Ramaphosa had announced that about 10 000 healthcare field workers would from this week conduct nationwide home visit screening.
However, Sadtu spokesperson Nomusa Cembi told Independent Media that the union was not confident that screening would focus on covering all pupils.
“We would want every learner and every teacher to be screened as a preventative measure, but we are not saying that this is the prerequisite for the opening of schools,” he said.
Cembi said if the home visits failed to cover all pupils and teachers, then it would have to be done at schools.
CONCERN: Nomusa
She said the exact date of the school reopening would be known after a meeting of unions and basic education director general Mathanzima Mweli on 14 April.
The 21-day Coved-19 lockdown, which started on 26 March, is expected to end on 16 April but could be extended. According to the Basic Education memo, “teaching time lost may be recovered by the shortening of the winter and spring holidays”.
The memo also said that the second school quarter would be extended by three weeks “hence Grade 12 would not have vacation (June), and that the September holidays would be shortened by one day.
“Instead of cancelling the June holiday for Grade 12 completely, an option would be to extend the Term 2 school day for 2 hours to cover up the 5 days,” read the memo.
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