Summary of the COVID-19 protocol School and nurseries of Cantabria
In Cantabria, Infant and Primary will return on the 7th, while ESO, Baccalaureate and FP will return on the 10th. The community opts for a mandatory mask, reduction of groups and greater social distance. In addition, each center must send the families (or the students themselves if they are of legal age) a responsible statement, in which everyone must agree not to go to class if they have a fever or any other related symptoms of with COVID-19.
Protocol update, news
The centers will be able to create the figure of the COVID-19 coordinator, to whom the dialogue with the Ministry of Education will correspond. Depending on the epidemiological evolution, the Ministry of Education raises three possible situations: from the most normalized situation possible to the temporary suspension of face-to-face teaching, passing through a prioritization of it in stages.
Regarding resources, the Ministry will increase the number of teaching staff with an extraordinary 'Covid-19' quota that will improve the ratio between teachers and students. In addition, it will invest more than 700,000 euros in sanitary and preventive hygiene material.
The educational centers will take the temperature of the students, teaching and non-teaching staff before the start of the school day and the celebration of extracurricular activities and the service of early risers in the afternoons at school or similar is allowed provided that stable groups are not broken of coexistence and the rest of the prevention measures are fulfilled.
They are the main novelties included in the "Update to the general organizational protocol for the development of educational activity in the autonomous community of Cantabria during the 2020-2021 academic year, applicable until the end of the health crisis", published in the Official Gazette of Cantabria (BOC). This new text assumes new measures, included in the Education Sector Conference and the Interterritorial Council of the National Institute of Health, which Cantabria had initially opposed but which have finally assumed.
Complementary measures
The temperature measurement is implemented as a measure attached to the daily health check that is required of the entire educational community, and to which the families commit through the responsible declaration, which is maintained.
Thus, the centers will be able to implement the precise organization for the most appropriate temperature measurement -in the classroom or at the entrance of the center- depending on the number of students. In any case, and those centers that establish the temperature measurement before accessing the educational center, must be organized in such a way that crowds are avoided and the maintenance of an interpersonal distance of at least 1.5 meters is guaranteed.
It is advisable to check for fever before entering the school grounds for students exempt from wearing a mask, that is, the first and second cycles of Early Childhood Education (two-year-old classrooms and three-year-old students), according to the regional government in a press release.
According to the instructions given by Public Health, the protocol establishes that, with a temperature equal to or greater than 37.5 degrees, the student or center staff will not be able to stay in it. In the event that the device indicates a temperature equal to or only slightly higher, the measurement will be repeated after five or ten minutes.
Extracurricular and complementary
The protocol expressly recognizes that the priority of the educational administration is "the maintenance of the classroom activity in safety conditions".
However, it is recognized that the conciliation needs of families and the desire for a comprehensive training of students "make it necessary in many cases for their children to participate in complementary and extracurricular activities and in complementary services in educational centers."
Specifically, complementary activities within the center that involve the entry of non-staff personnel are suspended. This decision will be reviewed bimonthly, based on epidemiological data and in coordination with Public Health. And those outside the center are also suspended, with the exception of those that can be done on foot from the educational center and are held outdoors.
Cantabria does not consider delaying or staggering the 'back to school'
For their part, the distance between students who are not part of stable groups will be at least 1.5 meters when they wear a mask and more than two meters when they are not wearing it.
In addition, the use of the mask will be mandatory at all times for all students, including those from 3 to 6 years old, with the exception of, of course, the times when they take food or drinks. The same criteria for school transportation apply here.
Education admits that since the mask is contraindicated for children under three years of age, two-year-old students can only participate in these services if the establishment of a separate space (another room or, failing that, screens or similar devices) can be guaranteed.
Within this space, if two-year-old students from different stable coexistence groups participate, they must be separated from each other by at least three meters.
Finally, the person responsible for the organization of these services (entity, companies, association, ...) must be in charge of cleaning and disinfecting the spaces used after use and, in any case, before the start of the school day.
For its part, the celebration of extracurricular activities will be governed by the same principles as the early bird service in relation to the maintenance of stable groups, interpersonal distance and disinfection and cleaning.
In addition, the specific nature of each extracurricular activity will imply the establishment of additional and specific measures for each of them that, in addition, will have to add the strict maintenance of stable groups of coexistence.
Thus, for example, extracurricular activities of a sporting nature will be held, whenever possible, outdoors; Each discipline will be governed by the specific protocol approved by the corresponding Federation and, where appropriate, by the guidelines set by the Higher Sports Council for non-professional sports and, in addition, the stable coexistence groups formed for the school day.
"All spaces, all moments"
The Minister of Education, Marina Lombó, has said that she "understands perfectly" the difficulties that these measures could pose for the organization of services such as early risers or for extracurricular services.
These are requirements that, in certain cases, may necessarily mean that some activities "cannot be carried out directly"; although she defends the need to establish "homogeneous" prevention measures in "all spaces and moments of life in the centers."
"It would make no sense to demand such strict organizational measures from educational centers, such as the formation of stable groups of students that do not interact with each other, to allow students of different levels and stages to meet in the centers themselves" Lombó has said.