Nearly 19 mln students resume classes after break

ISTANBUL

Approximately 19 million students and 1.2 million teachers have returned to schools as the one-week break ends, with education in some districts of the quake-hit provinces of Hatay and Adıyaman, which was earlier suspended due to the quake, now resumed.

Students cheered on the first day of school out of excitement as they reunited with their classmates following the second-semester break.

Due to the deadly Feb. 6 quakes in Türkiye’s south, authorities suspended education in schools in 10 quake-hit provinces.

With efforts ongoing to bring life back to normal in the quake-hit zone, education in schools is gradually being resumed in the troubled provinces. However, schools in some districts of Hatay and Adıyaman, the most damaged regions by the quakes, remain closed.

With the start of education in these districts as of April 24, students in the country’s all 81 provinces reunited with their friends and teachers and resumed classes after a long hiatus.

Remedial education program to be applied

In the meantime, a program will be prepared to compensate for curriculum deficiencies of the quake-affected students during periods of interruption in education, Education Minister Mahmut Özer announced in a televised interview on April 24.

This remedial program will be conducted between Aug. 1 and Sept. 1, when schools close for summer break.

Özer also stated that if the performance of quake-affected students decreased in the second semester and their grades were below average, only their first semester grades would be considered when calculating the end-of-year grade point average.

Nearly 35,000 of the students who were previously transferred to other provinces after the earthquakes have returned to their own schools, Özer stated earlier.

The minister stated they take great care to bring education back to normal in the region and thanked the other ministries and officials for their support.

Özer added that as quake survivors were moved from tents to containers, the ministry started to provide televisions to all units to enable children to study by watching TRT EBA, a distance education channel broadcasting different programs based on the courses included in the curriculum.