DIMAPUR, MAY 17 (MExN): The All Nagaland Private Schools’ Association (ANPSA) today asked the Chief Minister to review the use of private hostels and schools as quarantine centres.
In a letter to the CM, the ANPSA informed that in all the private schools, offices are open to facilitate online learning and in many schools teachers are using the school infrastructure for online video conferencing classes and preparing other online lessons, tests and exams.
If private hostels and schools are being requisitioned as quarantine centres then many private schools will have to give up serving its students through online classes as in almost all the schools, school hostels are also attached to private schools, it argued.
It further pointed out that many private schools are in crowded and populated urban areas. The association said it is s preferable that quarantine centres are placed in the outskirts of the urban/city areas.
“Waste disposal, laundry, meal preparations, entry and exist of people, ventilation, sanitation and cleaning and handling of PPEs etc. is also a major problem in crowded areas in hostels and schools not built for such purposes,” it added.
The ANPSA further stated that schools/hostels do not meet the requirement of being a community based quarantine facility. Many hostels have single dormitories with shared bathrooms, toilets and common mess areas. Dormitories are not built for isolation but meant for facilitating social interaction, it added.
It also said that the private schools do not have trained staff to run quarantine centres. “Moreover it will be difficult to turn over private schools to people who will not be familiar with the infrastructure and facilities of the hostels,” it said.
The association further said that many schools have residential staff with families living inside the school campus. They have no other place to go to, it stated.
Therefore the ANPSA urged the government to first use other facilities such as private hotels, government hostels and other government buildings or build temporary quarantine facilities away from city centers.
“We do not know how long the lock down will go on or when schools will reopen to run normally. Therefore Government may kindly support Private Schools and allow all its staff to focus on the learning process uninterrupted during this time of crisis,” it appealed.
