JONATHAN JANSEN | Schools should absolutely not reopen in lockdown level three
Government does not prioritise children and teachers. If it did, thousands of training hours would not be ashes
Officially, about 2,000 teachers have died of Covid-19. Think about that.
Let us assume that it took four years to train each of them, the basic duration of an education degree (BED) or a three-year general Bachelor’s degree, with an additional year of teacher training (PGCE). Older teachers might hold a certificate of two or three years, but consider that washed out by the many hours of in-service teacher training during the course of a career. So four years it is, and for 2,000 teachers that means these deaths count as 8,000 years of teacher training lost in one year because of the pandemic. For an education planner, that staggering loss of teaching expertise is a disaster; for the families of the deceased, the loss is an unfathomable tragedy. Should schools reopen as scheduled?..