Schools in Bahrain welcomed students back to classrooms on Sunday 14 March after the National Taskforce for Combating Coronavirus permitted educational institutions to reopen. Parents could choose classroom attendance or remote learning, with preparations intended to support learning in a suitable and healthy school environment.

The Ministry of Education directed government-school administrations to use the arrangements followed during the first semester. Schools surveyed parents wishing to register their children for attendance, and the ministry provided school buses on the usual routes for students returning in person.

Education worldwide faced a crisis that might have been among the most serious of the modern era. From March 2020, the pandemic disrupted the education of more than 1.6 billion students in 161 countries, nearly 80% of enrolled schoolchildren globally.

The ministry’s steps came at an appropriate time, giving students the chance to learn through classroom attendance or remotely under the circumstances.

The shared task was to keep education progressing as well as possible while confronting the pandemic. The greater challenge was to limit its negative effects on education and turn the experience into an opportunity for Bahrain’s students.