Gambia’s Education Minister Defends Extended School Days

The Minister of Basic and Secondary Education (MoBSE), in Gambia, Claudiana Cole, advanced reasons for stretching School days from Monday to Saturday, when she appeared before the country’s National Assembly.

Cole appeared to give explanations in response to a question raised by the Member for Bakau, Assan Touray, who asked the Minister to inform Members of parliament of the modalities in place to support learning activities in bigger schools, adding that students have resumed in the midst of a pandemic with school days stretched from Monday to Saturday.

In her response, the Minister told the MPs that the Ministry developed modalities for the reopening of Schools to ensure continuity of learning during the pandemic.

She said the models are tailored to suit the needs of Schools with a target of achieving 200 days on the School calendar. She however said the modalities are not one size fits all; that hence based on simulation, only 23 Schools across the country were expected to alternate.

Cole also explained the reasons for stretching School days from Monday to Saturday for Primary Schools and for all categories of Schools as well.

She said considering the social distancing requirement in Classrooms, those that accommodate up to 45, will take half of that number.

She said the Ministry needed to double the number of Classrooms that are currently available to be able to accommodate students and to give them equal amount of contact time for the School year.

She said this is the reason why for Schools which did not have enough Classrooms, they had to use different models and the alternating model is one that they use for the big Schools.

The Minister said this will ensure that all students would have the opportunity to be in Schools for a certain number of days in a week.