[attach id=280370 size="medium"]Children make their way in to school yesterday. Photo: Chris Sant Fournier[/attach]
It is unacceptable for schoolchildren to be waiting at the bus stop for transport as early as 6.30am, two hours before class starts, Education Minister Evarist Bartolo said yesterday.
“This is not right. We have a situation where children are leaving home before their parents head off to work. We have to address this,” he said, adding that state school transport was meant to pick up children an hour before school started.
The minister was standing outside Pembroke’s St Clare College on the occasion of the first day of the scholastic year. A total of 31,000 children started attending government schools yesterday.
This year was marked with a difference since, for the first time, one government secondary school was converted into a co-ed school.
St Clare’s secondary school, previously a girls’ school, welcomed 80 boys among its 149 Form 1 students.
Mr Bartolo said that this year, also for the first time, state schools were introducing the concept of a middle school at St Clare’s. This meant that Form 1 and Form 2 students were kept in a separate wing from Form 3, 4 and 5 students.
State school buses transported 11,000 students on 500 routes
This ensured a smoother transition for students from primary to secondary school. St Clare’s headmistress Mary Rose Leone said it also served to ensure boys did not feel outnumbered. She explained that teachers were initially concerned about having boys and girls in their classrooms but, following some training, they were now embracing the change.
The minister said he had started discussions with other heads of schools to discuss the possibility of opting for co-ed education or introducing the concept of middle school, something that already existed in private schools in Malta.
He added that St Clare’s College had undergone extensive maintenance works during the summer, amounting to about €500,000. Works included building and fencing of the periphery wall and works on the school gymnasium and football ground.
Speaking in general terms, Mr Bartolo said all seemed to have run smoothly on the first day of school.
In all 19,131 primary students and 11,923 secondary pupils, together with 3,542 teaching staff returned to school yesterday.
There were no major hiccups in the running of the Government school transport that carried students through some 500 routes.
Things ran smoothly despite the fact that buses, owned by the Unscheduled Bus Service, were also being used for public transport as Arriva temporarily suspended the use of bendy buses.
To mark the start of the scholastic year, the Nationalist Party’s education spokesman Joe Cassar issued an open letter to educators expressing the party’s appreciation for their role in molding the leaders of tomorrow.
“Teachers are never ones to have their roles flaunted to the public… we hope they will always find administrative backing and all the necessary aid they require to continue offering the best service,” he said.