Ombudsman's Office calls for extended school classes and increased capacity in classrooms

Despite the return to face-to-face classes that arrived this Monday for 64 per cent of schoolchildren, the Office of the Ombudsman asked to extend class hours for the recovery of learnings. This autonomous constitutional body initiated supervision at the national level with the aim of knowing the conditions under which the return to school is taking place.

One of the main problems detected on the first day was a reduced schedule of face-to-face classes due to school attendance by groups of students, which which complies with the regulations on capacity, since one meter of distance must be maintained between students, and to the lack of availability of classrooms or teachers on campus.

INSUFFICIENT NUMBER OF HOURS OF CLASSES

For this reason, he considered that today “students have a short time of face-to-face classes, which is inadequate for learning cash of all subjects. In addition, it constitutes a setback for those students who last year received full-time virtual classes and this year only half of those hours in face-to-face classes, because the teacher has to attend the same classroom at two different times. For example, one group from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. and another group from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.”

In addition, they mentioned that in some schools the schedule of face-to-face classes is two shifts with 3 hours a day for each one. This adds up to only 15 hours per student per week. In other schools, “the schedule for face-to-face classes has been established on an interday basis, which also implies an insufficient number of hours dedicated to face-to-face classes”.

ALSO IN PRIVATE SCHOOLS

Regarding private schools, the Office of the Ombudsman indicated that similar situations have been occurring, “which merits immediate and detailed sincere on the part of the Ministry of Education through a Situational Education Room where the effective schedule of face-to-face classes for each school in the country is published, as well as other data relating to back to school”.

Alicia Abanto, deputy for the State Administration of the Office of the Ombudsman, said that the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health should evaluate a more flexible capacity in classrooms in order to achieve a significant increase in the service of face-to-face classes.

After detecting the few hours of face-to-face classes that have been established in several schools in the country, Abanto considered that the increase in teaching hours with the presence of students in the classroom should be an emergency and a priority for the State. For her, the rules on capacity should be amended as there is an urgent need to make up for the hours lost in learning as a result of school closures for two years.

“The Ministry of Education must focus its objectives on the recovery of learning, so it must extend the hours of face-to-face classes nationwide, with greater capacity in the classrooms according to the conditions of each educational establishment,” he said.

65% GO BACK TO SCHOOL

This Monday, 64% of students from public educational institutions in the country returned to the classroom to start the 2022 school year. Education Minister Rosendo Serna thanked the education community and the regional and local governments for the joint work that made it possible to resume face-to-face classes after two years when schools were closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

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