FNC demands shorter school hours, promoting social workers

Abu Dhabi: Members of the Federal National Council (FNC) have demanded that school hours and days be shortened and the automatic grade promotion policy be scrapped.

Members urged the government to reconsider its education policy and give students longer summer holidays to avoid going to school in hot weather. The majority of the members eventually voted in favour of the motion, which will be submitted to the Cabinet for review.

The debate stirred by one member from Abu Dhabi encouraged other group of members to discuss the issue.

School principles, however, told Gulf News that shorter school days and longer holidays means that children will not get enough time to finish syllabus. Syed Tabrez, principal of Emirates English Speaking School in Dubai said “The current hours are sufficient and shortening the hours will not be enough to meet the requirements of the curriculum.In a session allocated to discuss the Ministry of Education’s development plan, Dr Mohammad Bin Ham Al Ameri, FNC member from Abu Dhabi, said school hours were increased by 60 per cent and school days were raised from 145 days to 180 days, which left students with not enough time to play or interact with family members.

Dr Al Ameri said with long school hours come pupils’ tiredness, less concentration, which eventually make schools hateful.

“The negative effects of long school day include weak family relationship, bad food habits and lack of identity,” he said.

Dr Al Ameri said students won’t actually learn anything after a certain point, citing overloading of work and stress on both teachers and students.

He suggested that school hours and days be shortened to fit the UAE’s climate and traditions, which was rejected by other members.

Humaid Al Qutami, Minister of Education, said 180 school days in an academic year is the international average while other countries such as South Korea and Japan have 220 days.

“School hours were only increased by 35-50 minutes a day to keep competitive schooling,” Al Qutami said.

Dr Abdul Rahim Al Shaheen, a member from Ras Al Khaimah, asked why it is a problem to have a longer school day in the public school while certain private school still have far longer days which end at 4pm.

Dr Mona Al Bahar, a member from Dubai, agreed that longer school day is better as she backs students’ stay in school rather than returning home early to housemaids’ supervision.

However, Musabah Al Katbi, a member from Sharjah, suggested that the motion be referred to the FNC education committee for further debate.

Principal of girls section at Ittihad Private School, the Mamzar branch agrees with Tabrez and stated that hours should not be shortened. “Most private schools start from 8 am and end at 2:30 pm or 3:30 pm while most public schools start at 7:30am to 1:30 pm. These timings are sufficient for us to cover the material included in the curriculum and one should not forget that these hours also include breaks.”

Palestine national Mai Jameel, mother of two, however, said that school timings should be shorter. “I think that my children are too young to stay in school for this long,”

Aisha Al Yamahi, a member from Fujairah, said many social workers at schools across the UAE put long service of up to 20 years but received no promotion.

Al Qutami said nearly 8,000 teachers and school staff were promoted in just six months last year and the near future will see other school staff including social workers promoted.

Shaikha Eisa, a member from Umm Al Quwain, criticised the school examination system and the so-called ‘automatic promotion” of schoolchildren.

“The automatic promotion system which allows school children to be promoted regardless of passing exams led to extreme lack of reading and writing skills,” Shaikha said.

She added an average of 60 pupils in each school across the country lack reading and writing skills, which isa “disastrous” situation.

Al Qutami said the examination and student performance assessment system will be evaluated within two weeks and action will be taken accordingly.

Withinput by Noor Nazzal, Special to Gulf News