Minister of Science and Education Radovan Fuchs said on Wednesday that schools won't close automatically but will stay open as long as possible because "we can't gamble with the education of children and younger generations."

“As the number of infections is increasing in the general population, it is also growing among students. We have been informed that about 120 schools could go online. We are staying with our initial doctrine and that is that we will not fully transfer to online classes nor do we recommend to counties to do so,” Fuchs told reporters in Parliament House following the record number of new COVID cases in the country.

The global trend is in line with what we have been saying from the beginning, he underscored, and that is a change in doctrine as far as schools are concerned. “You all said that schools should be the last to shut down in order to avoid isolation for students. We are talking with the public health institute and national COVID response team to revise the approach of sending students into self-isolation because entire grades are being sent into self-isolation if only one student tests positive,” said Fuchs.

He added that at the moment 50% of schools do not have even one infected student and 152 schools have one or two positive students, so the view that we should keep schools open as long as possible is correct.

“There are several cases where teachers and technical staff in schools are a problem and not just the children and we will talk with the institute to see what can be done,” he added.