An education ministry spokesperson told FMT that 204,155 pre-school students, 454,827 Primary 1 students and 448,113 Primary 2 students were expected to kick off their school year today.
While the number of daily Covid-19 cases has been consistently above 2,000 for most of this year, parents agree they cannot continue sacrificing their children’s education while waiting for the figures to decrease.
“Their schooling has been stop-start since last year and it has affected their learning,” said Siti Arbiah Miasil before sending her daughter off to Primary 1 at SK Puchong Jaya 2 today.
“We may think it’s dangerous to send them back to school, but they have to catch up with their studies. We don’t know when this pandemic will end.”
Mohd Yusof Mokhtar, meanwhile, said he was confident the education ministry would have taken the relevant steps to ensure a safe return to school for students.
While he expressed concern about the high number of daily cases, Yusof believed it would be beneficial if students could return to school even if just for a couple of days a week so they could interact with teachers.
“I believe the students will be safe if they follow all the SOPs set out by the government and education ministry,” the 43-year-old said.
“They’re not very focused at home, and we (parents) can only guide them so much.”
On Feb 19, education minister Radzi Jidin announced that preschoolers, Year 1 and 2 students would start school on March 1 while those in Year 3 to 6 would return on March 8.
Secondary schools, meanwhile, will be opened in two groups on April 4 and 5.
Dennis Ong, 52, said it was only natural for parents to be worried about the return to school due to the high number of cases.
Ong’s son started Primary 1 today, and while he could not accompany his son to his class due to new education ministry SOPs, he agreed it was a necessary precaution.
“Hopefully everything goes well. We have to start somewhere,” he said.
“We have to make sure we send kids to schools when they reopen. If not, what are they going to do at home?
“I’m sure the school knows how to keep them safe.”
Meanwhile, parents at SK Dato’ Onn Jaafar in Subang mostly had mixed feelings about the reopening of schools, saying they were worried about the Covid-19 situation but also their childrens’ educational development.
Gunaseelan Gunasekaran, 41, felt a mixture of excitement and concern for his seven-year-old daughter’s first day in school, but said he was confident in the SOPs implemented in schools.
The senior IT engineer said studying at home for nearly one year had been quite difficult for kids due to the vastly different environment compared with being in school.
“It’s different learning at school than learning with their parents, so this is better. So far there have been no Covid-19 clusters in schools, thankfully,” he told FMT, when met outside SK Dato’ Onn Jaafar in Subang Jaya here today.
Herman Shah, 30, said his seven-year-old daughter was excited about going to school but he was more cautious about the Covid-19 numbers, telling FMT that children might forget about the SOPs.
“She’s excited but we’re a little afraid, especially since it’s her first day of school. But we’ll see how it goes,” he said, while accompanying his daughter.
A woman who only wanted to be known as Ong, said she was more worried about her eight-year-old because she might be too young to know how to take care of herself.
While the SOPs that have been set are good, the mother of two girls told FMT she was more concerned about whether the students themselves would follow the guidelines.
“We can give them everything, including hand sanitisers, face masks and face shields, but the question is whether they will use it or not,” she said.
When asked if schools in Selangor should have followed Sarawak in reopening two weeks later, the parents were ambivalent, expressing apprehension at the thought of their kids continuing classes at home.
They felt that while school reopening could have been delayed, it would have also affected their kids’ studies.