Manono struggles with COVID19 school plan

By Talaia Mika 03 April 2020, 9:30PM

The Ministry of Education, Sports and Culture’s plan to utilise TV and radio to deliver lessons for primary and secondary school students has received mixed feedback from parents.

With schools closed due to the coronavirus state of emergency (S.O.E.), the Government has had to be creative in terms of delivering much-needed school lessons.

Some parents welcome the plan.

But some are struggling to comprehend how it will work. At Manono for instance, Seumaalii Magia said they don’t have the infrastructure for it.

“The majority of the families here don’t have television or radio,” he said.

“Even this talk about online technology, no one knows anything here about that stuff.

“Families here live close to each other and from what I have observed myself, the children are just roaming around randomly doing nothing.

The parents are not putting education first and it’s all because of the lack of access and knowledge about these new things they are talking about.”

Another concern parent in Manono, Upu Faamaoni, admitted that her children have not been studying since schools closed. She said they also don’t have a TV or a radio.

 “The only thing I know we have is a phone,” she said.

The same goes for Tautala Tauga, a mother of four primary school students.

“Our TV doesn’t function properly,” she said.

For Mrs. Tauga, she said she has no knowledge at all of what is going on with the state of emergency.

 “All we know is that schools are closed and our children are to stay home,” she said.

 “I’m monitoring my children’s studies at (some) nights which I know is kind of useless as all I do is watch them study and make sure they study but I don’t know if they are really studying.”

She said this is a similar experience for majority of the parents on the island.

Attempts to get a comment from the school principal was not successful.

 

 

By Talaia Mika 03 April 2020, 9:30PM
Samoa Observer

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