LAHORE: All Pakistan Private Schools Federation (APPSF) has condemned the decision of NCOC of extension the ongoing schools closure, and said that instead of keeping the campuses closed the government should go for micro lockdown.
President APPSF Kashif Mirza said that the schools have already faced an irreparable loss of education of 75 million students and it is impossible to make up for the educational loss due to lockdown especially when 25 million children in Pakistan are out of schools.
Mirza demanded to vaccinate all the children and teachers on priority basis despite of schools closure.
Mirza further demanded the government to provide free laptops, net facilities along with devices to the students.
Kashif Mirza also rejected the government’s decision to cancel all examinations till 15th June. APPSF President Kashif Mirza said the government would have to fully implement the SOPs but it failed to do so.
He said the cancellation of exams would leave a drastic impact on the students’ future and they would lose six to seventh months to be promoted to the next class.
Kashif Mirza cited that different global organisations have advised keeping schools open while reciting results of Gallup’s survey according to which 87% of parents want resumption of schools.
He said political gatherings should be banned instead as the same were threats to the lives of millions of people. He said that a large number of children who did not go to school because of closure were becoming part of child labour.
He further said the closure was also resulting in economic murder of thousands of teachers and people associated with schools.
All Pakistan Private Schools Federation (APPSF) President Kashif Mirza applauded the government’s decision to resume educational activities for grade 9-12 across the country after over a month’s gap but at the same time, objected to following the phase-wise regime.
He called for the government to reopen educational institutions to save students’ academic year from wasting.
Shutting down schools was not the solution to the problem, Mirza said, and added that the association believes the use of the option of targeted micro-lockdown across the country to stem contagion spread.
He said that the continuous closure of private schools across the country has hurt owners as almost 10,000 schools across the country have been shut down and around 700,000 teachers have become unemployed.
Mirza further demanded the government announce a relief package for teachers.
He said that according to UNICEF, the closure of schools during the coronavirus pandemic had proven to be counter-productive while as many as 40 million children in Pakistan were affected due to schools’ shut down.
Discover more from Academia Magazine
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.