HYDERABAD: A little over 50% parents are willing to send their children to schools, subject to conditions, according to a new survey. Overall across the country, parents’ hesitancy has come down to 44% in August from 48% in July and 76% in June. Those willing to send children to school include parents who are unable to avail online classes or find them ineffective.
In Telangana while 42% parents were against opening of schools right now, 55% were okay with children going to school in August-September. Of those willing, 8 8% of parents from the state said that the government should consider opening schools after August 15, 23% voted for physical classes from September 1 and 24% said that offline classes should resume from September 15. About 3% opted for ‘can’t say’.
The survey by LocalCircles received about 10,000 responses (2,077 from Telangana) for the specific query on school reopening. The total sample size of the survey was 40,000.
Though parents showed their willingness, they also put forth steps to be taken up by authorities. About 67% from Telangana said that district administration should ensure schools had sufficient Rapid Antigen Test (RAT) kits to minimise the risk of Covid spread, while 83% of parents wanted the state to organise free vaccination camps at/near schools for all school staff.
“When willing parents were asked if these RAT kits should be made available to all schools via the district administrations, the majority (74%) across the country said yes. While 15%of parents did not want RAT to be done in schools, 4% said that the government should not be supplying RAT kits and 7% did not have an opinion,” read the survey. This question received 19,354 responses from parents across the country.
