On Sunday, the non-parliamentary Together party (Spolu) started a petition for opening schools on the otvormeskoly.sk website. Its aim is to call on the government to approach education as one of its main priorities. The chair of the Together party Juraj Hipš pointed to the fact that 50,000 children in Slovakia were left without any education and another 130,000 did not have access to online education during the first wave in spring. "By not providing children with proper education, we are taking away their chance for a successful life," said Hipš.
On Monday, Education Minister Branislav Groehling (Freedom and Solidarity) stated that he wants secondary schools to be reopened as of November 30. Prime Minister Igor Matovič (Ordinary People) said ten days ago that Groehling's ideas about reopening schools on November 30 were "literally death", and asked whether the figures which his Freedom and Solidarity party uses were ready to go out and dig graves. According to the TASR press agency, the PM conditions the further opening of schools by a significant reduction in the daily increments infected with the new coronavirus and other area-based tests, which are intended to be an effective tool for this reduction until the pre-Christmas holidays.
At the moment, only first four grades of elementary schools are open. High schools switched to distance learning in the middle of October and the second stage of elementary schools did so at the end of October.
