“Closing schools is not a button you can turn,” says Micha de Winter, professor of pedagogy at Utrecht University in news hour Today. “If you look from an educational perspective and the interests of pupils and students, you have to keep your fingers off that button. Closing the schools is really code black.” De Winter says it’s really the very last thing you should do. In the discussion about closure, he misses the question of what should be done to make education safer. Now it’s either open or closed.
“The consequences are so disastrous. The children at the bottom of the education ladder are falling further and further behind,” says De Winter, who would like to follow the line of ECDC, the European RIVM. The ECDC says that schools should remain open, but that measures should be taken such as keeping distance, more ventilation and spreading the time that students go home or have a break.
De Winter thinks it is very good to talk to children about what you can do to make the situation in school safer. “Children think it is important that education continues. They will think about it and devise measures together with each other and the teacher. Actively involve children in this.”
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