Ahead of reopening of schools and PU colleges amidst the pandemic, Deputy Commissioner Rohini Sindhuri on Wednesday made an appeal to the parents to send their children to schools and colleges as all measures had been taken for restarting the academic activities under safety.
Under the direct supervision of the district administration, the Vidyagama programme is being launched for the students of Class 6 to 9 and the academic session for Class 10 and second PU students is being commenced. The officials at the district and taluk levels had been asked to ensure the success of academic activities that were hit by COVID-19, confining the children in homes and taking up online learning.
In Mysuru district, there are 2,290 schools having students studying in Classes 6 to 10. The government, aided and unaided schools have about 2,08,605 students and 20,088 teachers.
A total of 956 government schools run classes from 6 to 8 and 232 schools have students studying in Class 9 and 10. In the schools, including aided and unaided, 1,68,495 students are in Class 6 to 9 and 40,110 students in Class 10.
Meanwhile, the school and college premises are being sanitised ahead of the reopening. The GPs had been told to provide thermal scanners to the schools.
The Health and other key departments had been asked to monitor strict implementation of COVID-19 guidelines in the schools and colleges and the precautions taken on the directions of the government.
The schools and colleges had been told to designate a classroom as an “isolation room” for symptomatic students and the teachers had been asked to monitor the health of each child and take them to hospital for a check-up if necessary.
Despite the reopening of schools, the distribution of foodgrains to students instead of cooked food as part of midday meal programmes will continue.
The DC has told the schools and colleges to ensure hygiene on the premises and constitute groups of 15-20 students for running the classes.
Many students lined up in front of Chikkagadiyara near Devaraja Market to give their swab samples for the RT-PCR test. Free PCR tests are being conducted by the Health Department. Free RT-PCR test had also been extended till Friday at J.K. Grounds.
Swabs are collected by the health workers and the samples sent to the lab of MMCRI here for the test. Swab collection centres function at various places in the city and the students had been asked to visit other centres as well instead of thronging one or two centres.
Nearly 3,500-4,000 RT-PCR tests are being done at the MMCRI lab. “The upsurge in testing has helped us to contain the spread of the pandemic,” said MMCRI Dean and Director C.P. Nanjaraj, adding that the number of tests may touch 5,000 in the days ahead.
