The Minister of Education in a special column: "Fight with me to save the children"

Isolations must be eliminated for healthy children so that we can save them and return to routine.

Do not take from the children the schools, the friends, the stability, the framework, the little routine they still have.

Fight with me, because our war is for them and for the parents

Education Minister Yifat Shasha Bitton

19/01/2022

Wednesday, January 19, 2022, 9:10 p.m.

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Day care centers move to the Ministry of Education: "An important journey for our children" (Photo: Facebook Ministry of Education)

The damage experienced by the education system as a result of the corona virus and the isolation policy is similar to the damage that also exists in other industries in the economy. The isolation policy is set only by the Ministry of Health. When it comes to our children, the harm is felt twice - both in the isolation of the children, and in the parents who are forced to stay at home. There is frustration from this and it is completely understandable. I'm struggling to change that.

The problem is not with the guidelines, but with unnecessary isolations of healthy children and decisions to unnecessarily suspend schooling. Do not take from the children the schools, the friends, the stability, the framework, the little routine they still have. We must do our utmost together to maintain as much routine as possible for our children.

So for weeks I've been fighting to break the unnecessary isolations of healthy children.

Green class or any solution proposed by the Ministry of Health - everything is acceptable.

The main thing is to stop the isolation of the children.

To my delight, this approach is shared by many doctors and experts who said over the past weekend, loud and clear, what I have been saying for a long time - the isolations of children cause them immense harm and severely hurt even parents whose livelihoods are damaged and are already on the edge after two complex years.

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The system and education staff do everything possible.

Shasha Bitton (Photo: Government Press Office, Oded Karni)

A first-grade student studies zoom (Photo: Reuven Castro)

It would have been easiest to shut down the education system and send everyone home, but we all see what a year and a half of closures has done to our children and what mental distress they are now facing.

Proposals to shut down the education system do not help students, they only aggravate their situation, create confusion, instill unnecessary instability and insecurity.

We also do not live in a reality of closure, so children can move around freely anywhere - but will not be within a framework and the results are known to everyone.

That is why I chose the right and complex solution, despite the criticism.

We have left the system open and we allow all children who can and want to come to school to do so.

It is true that not everything is perfect, this is how it is during a crisis experienced by the whole country, but the system and the education staff do everything possible with the tools at their disposal at this time to allow the system to be open.

Every child who comes - we save him.

No less than that.

We are prepared for digital studies when there is no other choice, but this is the last option in terms of the education system and not the preferred solution.

The Ministry of Health has made the right decision to shorten the isolations.

Horowitz and Ash (Photo: Flash 90, Tomer Neuberg)

Fight with me to stop the isolation of healthy children because our war is for them and for the parents. After all, in the end most of us agree that the system should not be shut down. I am optimistic and know that the struggle will eventually succeed. The Ministry of Health has in recent days made the right decision to shorten isolations to five days. Isolations must now be abolished for healthy children so that we can save them and return to a healthy routine in the education system.

The consequences of the crisis have long been here. A study conducted by the Office of the Chief Scientist at the Ministry of Education and the University of Haifa, based on data from the Educational Psychological Service, found that 70-60 percent of school students felt depressed following the corona crisis. 60 percent have difficulty falling asleep at night, 40 percent reported changes in appetite. There is a 70 percent increase in suicide prevention treatments.

These data constitute for me, as Minister of Education, a bright warning light about the dire consequences of isolation and frequent absences from the school bench.

This is also the main reason why I intend to act resolutely for the continued operation of the education system.

Every child who comes to school - we save him.

No less than that.

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