Children and young people in New Zealand's largest city Auckland will get support from the government for getting back to classroom learning when allowed by circumstances, said Education Minister Chris Hipkins and Associate Education Minister Jan Tinetti on Saturday.
The government support will cover the rest of this year and into 2022, according to the officials. Auckland has been in a lockdown since mid-August over the Delta variant of the COVID-19 virus.
New Zealand recorded 160 new community cases of COVID-19, marking a record of daily cases in the current outbreak, said the Ministry of Health in a statement on Saturday. Of the new community cases, 151 were detected in Auckland.
"Restrictions in Auckland and long periods of distance learning will have impacted on the progress of some children and young people. We are providing nearly 15 million New Zealand dollars (10.75 million U.S. dollars) to help them to get back into learning in the classroom as soon as it is safe for them to do so," Hipkins said.
"The investment will help our older students who are returning to school and heading into exams and support younger students to get back to face-to-face learning soon. We are currently speaking to primary schools and the wider sector about an indicative date of November 15," said the minister.
Tinetti said the package involves a wide range of targeted support.
"It will include community-based support and targeted funding for schools, and be used for counselling, learning support and initiatives to encourage attendance," she said.
"We want to help those students who are finding it tough to stay engaged with their learning through the remainder of term 4 and support them over summer so they return to school and Kura (schools where the teaching is in Maori and is based on Maori culture and values) next year," she said.
Three million New Zealand dollars (2.15 million US dollars) in rapid resurgence fund will go directly to schools and Kura that have identified students with immediate needs and who need support to stay engaged in learning at school. (ANI/Xinhua)
( With inputs from ANI )
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