Jakarta (ANTARA) - School clinics must be optimized to accommodate pupils at schools that have reopened for limited face-to-face learning activities, an official from the Education, Culture, Research, and Technology Ministry has said.

"School clinics must be optimized for the pandemic era and must be part of the COVID-19 task force at schools," director general of early, primary, and middle education at the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology, Sri Wahyuningsih, stated at an online conference on Friday.

School clinics should not exist only to fulfill legal regulations regarding facilities, but their operation must be made effective and should be fully utilized to educate pupils about a clean and healthy lifestyle, the director general added.

"I hope school clinics will not only exist as a label, as school clinics must be effective in providing healthcare services and educating school environment to the pupils," Wahyuningsih remarked.

The government had earlier instructed educational institutions to continue school activities through the distanced learning system, allowing a safer and healthier environment for the children to continue their studies from home, she informed.

But over time, several issues exposed the weaknesses of the distanced learning system, she said. Distanced learning did not provide a stimulus to children to move and perform physical activity, while lack of social engagement impeded children's character development, she pointed out.

To address issues caused by the distanced learning implementation, the government, through a joint ministerial decree, permitted offline school activities for the 2021/2022 school year to be resumed, Wahyuningsih said.

The authorities have asked reopened schools to strictly follow the health protocols to prevent the emergence of COVID-19 infection clusters, she added.

"Despite encouraging the authority to reopen schools and commencing offline school activities, we insist that clean and healthy lifestyle must be continued and health protocols must be observed wherever we are," the director general said.

Parents and school administrators have equal responsibility in ensuring children's adherence to health protocols, she added.









Translator: Lia WS, Nabil Ihsan
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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