School timings, uniform changed

70% of schools to reopen today, school starts at 9 am and ends at 3 pm.

LAHORE:

Students will return to school today (Friday) after a 10-day break, but at later hours and with elongated uniforms as dengue preventive measures.

Education Minister Mian Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman has decided that the school day should run from 9 am to 3 pm as mosquitoes are less active at this time than in the early morning, said an Education Department press release issued on Thursday. He also banned half-sleeved shirts and shorts as school uniforms. He said that no sports activities would be allowed in schools in the evenings.

The minister said that some 30 per cent of schools in Lahore hadn’t fumigated their classrooms and so would not be reopening on Friday.

He said that material on the dengue virus would be included in the school curriculum to raise awareness of the disease.

Also on Thursday, Agriculture Secretary Dr Arif Nadeem told reporters that 50 entomologists were working at the union council level to identify and eliminate breeding grounds for the mosquito that spreads the dengue virus.

Solid Waste Management and Pakistan Horticulture Authority were helping them. They are being supervised by MNA Sardar Ayaz Sadiq.



Published in The Express Tribune, September 23^rd, 2011.