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Jakarta schools to return to full capacity classes
The Jakarta administration has said it will allow schools to hold classes at full capacity starting in April as the city’s COVID-19 cases have eased.
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Back to school: Students of Pondok Bambu 02 state elementary school in East Jakarta attend class in person on Jan. 3. The Jakarta administration has said it will allow full-capacity in-person classes starting in April as the city's COVID-19 cases have eased. (Courtesy if kompas.com/Nirmala Maulana Achmad)
T
he Jakarta administration has said it will allow city schools to hold classes at full capacity starting in April as the city’s COVID-19 cases have eased, but educators’ groups say the administration should be cautious in the transition.
Jakarta Education Agency spokesperson Taga Radja Gah said on Thursday that schools at all education levels in Jakarta would hold in-person classes at full occupancy starting in April. He did not provide further details on the reopening plan.
The central government has gradually eased COVID-19 restrictions, and Jakarta’s proposed return to full-capacity in-person learning, which was previously tested in January, comes a few weeks after the city’s COVID-19 public mobility restrictions (PPKM) were lowered to level 2 of the four-tiered system.
Read also: Pandemic curbs eased in Surabaya, Jakarta
According to a joint decree signed by Education, Culture, Research and Technology Minister Nadiem Makarim and four other Cabinet members in December of last year, schools in areas under level 2 PPKM may operate at full capacity, provided that 80 percent of their staff have been inoculated.
Jakarta, previously the epicenter of the country’s third coronavirus wave, reported 729 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, less than 5 percent of the capital’s peak of new cases on Feb. 6, when it recorded 15,000 new infections.
Education and Teachers Association (P2G) national coordinator Satriawan Salim said that while teachers and students welcomed the plan to reopen schools, the Jakarta administration should consider a more gradual reopening to allow students to readjust to the necessary health protocols for in-person learning.
