The Minister of Education and Sports Janet Museveni, has announced January 10 as the day for the reopening of all schools in the country after about two years of closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Minister who was speaking at the closure of the 28th Annual Education and Sports Sector Review Workshop on Wednesday, revealed that learners of all levels including pre-primary, primary, and secondary
schools shall resume schooling on the same date.
She said that first term will operate for fourteen weeks from Monday January 10 to April 15 followed by a holiday of three weeks.
Second term will then open for fourteen weeks from Monday, 09th of May 9 until Friday August 19 followed by a holiday of three weeks.
Third term will start on Monday September 5 to December 9
followed by a holiday of seven weeks till January 29, 2023.
According to the Minister, only learners who are at least six years of age
shall be allowed to join Primary One. She says by the time schools closed for the second COVID-19 national lockdown in June, 2021, learners in P. 4, P.5, and P.6 had already completed their assessments and promoted to the next respective Classes; that is, P.5, P.6, and P.7.
“The P.1, P.2, and P.3 Classes of 2020 shall report in the next respective Classes of P.2, P.3, and P.4. Remedial lessons shall be provided for these classes during First Term 2022 to help them cover critical content for the previous class,” she says.
“Senior One and Senior Two Classes of 2020 shall be progressed to Senior Two and Senior Three respectively”
“Remedial lessons shall be provided these classes during the First Term of 2022 thought they had been beneficiaries of home study materials. The Senior Three and Senior and Senior Five Class of 2020 shall progress to Senior Four and Senior Six respectively upon reporting for the First Term of 2022,” adds the Minister.
She adds that UNEB shall release its calendar for the end-of cycle examinations to be conducted in 2022 and when candidates shall be registered now that the school re-opening Calendar has been defined.
Warns against increasing school fees
Museveni has used today’s event to caution schools against arbitrary increase of school charges.
“We appeal to Schools to be mindful that these learners are coming from families that have also been facing a tough time just as much as the schools have been,” she note.
“We have guided before that upon re-opening; even as it were after the first lockdown, parents should not be asked to pay higher school fees than what they were paying before school closures,” adds the Minister.
She also commented on situation of where the Senior two Class of 2020 reported to school for less than two weeks before schools were closed again for the second COVID-19 national lockdown yet some of them had
already paid up all that term’s school fees.
She underscored that, “For learners of the Senior Two Class of 2020 who had fully paid-up school fees should not pay first term’s fees when they report in their former School for the new academic year that starts in January 2022.”