Preparing for the new school year: clash of views

Baku / 28.08.20 / Turan: A new academic year 2020-2021 is beginning  in Azerbaijan. To prevent infection with corona virus, Traditional education has been stopped in the country since March 2020, to prevent infection with corona virus; secondary and higher educational institutions have been closed.

Students, as well as schoolchildren, began to receive online lessons via the Internet through information technology.

All hoped that  the period of the pandemic would quickly end, and education, like all spheres of life, would return to its normal course, but this did not happen. According to the representatives of the World Health Organization (WHO), it is impossible to predict the exact time of the disappearance of the virus.

In any case, it was clear that the virus would not disappear soon, and then all activities, including education, would have to move to a new platform that would correspond to the new conditions.

 On August 27, at a briefing of the Operational Headquarters under the Cabinet of Ministers, Education Minister Emin Amrullayev answered journalists' questions about the upcoming academic year.

According to the minister, from September 15 to October 1, kindergartens are planned to open in places where the virus is weak. At the primary school level, it is recommended that first graders attend school 2-3 times a week and other students twice a week if the number of active patients is high.

Students in grades 10-11 will take online lessons from September 15 to October 15, with a return to school scheduled for October 15. However,  this is not a final decision, the Minister said. And the return of students in grades 5-9 to school is scheduled for October 1. According to the minister, universities will begin to operate remotely from September 15.

Kamran Asadov, a member of the Public Council under the Ministry of Education, an expert on education, believes that the minister did not say anything new in connection with the onset of the new academic year.

The expert considers the partial opening of schools to be a positive event.

K. Asadov believes that this year, at least 50% of the students were left without training, tele-lessons, the project of a virtual school did not justify themselves. “In the virtual school project, 1 million children have been registered, but 600 thousand students have not been registered,” the expert notes.

In his opinion, now it is better for elementary school students to go to school 3 times a week, this is better than daily online lessons, negative here is the high risk of contracting the virus through live contact.

According to Asadov, the decision made in connection with universities is not so successful. The first courses will begin on October 1 due to the delay in entrance exams to universities this year, and not because of the decision of the Ministry of Education.

“Therefore, the decision on when to start training, preparatory courses, tutoring, had to be unambiguous. There were no proposals in this direction, the question remained open. They talk about online, distance education, but the law on distance education has not been adopted, so the law on distance education must be adopted."

K. Asadov says that the minister made a statement that teachers' salaries will not decrease, but teachers of traditional education and online education cannot receive the same salary. This issue has not been clarified. “What will be the difference between people teaching two days and teaching three days?

An important decision here is that previously students took active classes for 34 weeks or 210 days. Now it will be 68 days, that is, twice a week. Lessons that are 210 days long cannot be taught for 68 days. At the same time, it is wrong to ask a student for three-day assignments in one day.

"The proposals of the Ministry of Education in connection with training were very late.In March it was said that the ministry should have plans A, B, C for training. However, there were no new proposals or new programs.

Another member of the Public Council, expert Malahat Murshudlu also says that the ministry should have had a plan A, B, options in accordance with the conditions, but, unfortunately, this did not happen, there is little time left before the start of classes, and proposals are being submitted for discussion only now ...

"The main problem is a pandemic. No one can predict when the virus will disappear. It means that the people and the country must be adapted to this virus, this must be taken into account in education. Therefore, we must also take measures in the field of education," the expert says.

However, M. Murshudul considers unacceptable distance learning in higher schools. She believes that in connection with the pandemic, traditional education can be applied by observing the three “golden rules”.

“Online lessons have shown that if we want to start distance learning, we must take into account that this provides for modern information technologies, fast and uninterrupted Internet, this is also a large financial means for buying a computer for each child in the family, it is quite expensive type of training ”.

According to the expert, online lessons have proved that the country's education is not ready to this type of education. The quality of attendance and education was not ensured in the villages and rural areas near Baku city, and the quality of students' knowledge was not assessed. -0-