“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”

— Albert Einstein

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Ireland’s Taoiseach (Prime Minister) announced the closure of many activities on 12th March such as:

• Schools, colleges, and childcare facilities close
• Cultural institutions closed
• Indoor gatherings of more than 100 people should be canceled
• Outdoor gatherings of more than 500 people should be canceled
• People should continue to go to work, but those who can work from home should do so
• Shops, cafes, and restaurants to stay open

WATCH: Full speech by Taoiseach Leo Varadkar as the country’s schools, colleges and childcare facilities are to close in response to the Covid-19 pandemic | Read more: https://t.co/0dZzTUDn4s pic.twitter.com/URGFZUb2jn

— RTÉ News (@rtenews) March 12, 2020

From 12th March till Schools re-opening 1st September, Education institutions had a lot of time for understanding, planning, preparing, and executing COVID-measures. Institutions had to sanitize the whole building, install hand sanitizing vending machines for each room. Formulating ideas to prevent mass gatherings during break/lunchtime. I’d say my college faired well.

😲Major Changes

The changes were not surprising, rather it was expected or predictable to say the least. Some of the changes were:

• 🧼Hand Sanitizer Manual Machines in every classroom
• 🪑Square tables for each student
  1. One meter apart from the other table
• 🚪Students must sanitize their hands and only then, enter the classroom
• 🌱Base classrooms
• 🚧Designated common areas (to sit and eat during break time) for each Year
• 😷Compulsory to wear Wear Face Masks or face visors

👩‍🏫Class Tutors

Having a lot of information to pass to the pupils, Portlaoise College came up with the concept called

“Class Tutoring for 2 hours from 9 am to 11 am.”

Portlaoise College, Secondary-School;

Each forum was designated with one class tutor. The class tutor’s primary role is to explain the rules and guidelines of the COVID-measure. The secondary role was to make students feel better, by discussing with students about how they spend their holidays? What new things did they learn? All that sort of Jazz. I liked the concept because of two main reasons: