HCMC to put 680,000 more students back in schools

The 7th, 8th, 10th, and 11th graders will get back to school three weeks after the city kicked off the plan to resume in-person classes, starting with ninth and 12th graders.

Foreign language and informatics centers as well as life skills education institutions can also organize direct classes from Jan. 4 if they meet the set of criteria for pandemic prevention.

As for the first-semester examination, students from the seventh to 12th grades will take the exam at school while those from third to fifth grades will do it online.

First and second graders will take it once they get back to school later. The city has yet to make a specific plan for those grades.

Around 150,000 9th and 12th graders in the city have returned to school since Dec. 13.

As of Dec. 26, 60 Covid-19 cases had been detected in schools, including 51 students.

A survey by the municipal Education Department has found 60-80 percent of parents the city agreed with the plan to have more secondary and high-school students back in school.

The city has vaccinated more than 709,000 children aged 12-17 with at least one dose and 85.5 percent of them have received the second dose.