Education Ministry announces return of COVID-era distance learning

Schools throughout Israel are to remain closed tomorrow, but approval has been given to begin distance learning, the Education Ministry announces.

“Following an assessment of the security in accordance with guidance from Home Front Command, the Education Ministry announces that tomorrow there will be no in-person education activities throughout the country,” the ministry says in a statement.

Distance learning, in the style implemented previously during the coronavirus lockdowns of 2020-21, has been approved, with each school to coordinate its own schedule, the ministry says.

Individual schools will still be able to potentially have in-person learning or activities, but only in coordination with the ministry, the IDF’s Home Front Command and the school’s local authority.

In a separate notice, the ministry announces the creation of a special office to help integrate students and parents who have been displaced by the fighting, with the aim of providing educational and psychological support while they stay in emergency or absorption centers.

Since the start of the hostilities Saturday, most of the residents from communities bordering the Gaza Strip have been evacuated. In addition, the current massive callup of IDF reservists has drawn from teaching and administrative staff, leaving educational institutions countrywide shorthanded.