And while the myriad COVID complications can be confounding, Faber says that he has tabled a proposal to the Managing Authorities of secondary schools for an early start to the next school year.
Normally, the 2020/2021 school year would have started in September. But, because students were deprived of months of contact time because of COVID 19, the Ministry wants to start the next school year on August 1st, 2020, 1 month early.
Faber explained why:
Hon. Patrick Faber - Minister of Education
"As I mentioned, I'm just out of a meeting with secondary school leaders, and I threw out the idea, and I'll say it now again, that we're toying with the idea of reopening schools at the point of the start of August, so that we can have that month of August. You will recall that we now have quite a number of teachers engaged in professional development. Those of you who knows how our system works will know that it is within the early weeks of August, which is not a holiday month for teachers, that we have our teachers engaged in that kind of professional development training. So, if they're getting it now, and we have - I'm told - over 2,000 teachers who are engaged online in training, if they are getting that now, then that frees them up at that point for us to start the school year a bit earlier for us to do diagnostic testing on the students who have been promoted without the proper completion of a year, to see where they stand, before we begin the work of the new academic year. So again, we're looking at an early start in the school year, as opposed to what we have been accustomed to in September. We will do our best to be ready for then."
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