HK schools to reopen on April 19 for half-day classes

HONG KONG - Hong Kong kindergartens and primary and international schools will be allowed to resume half-day in-person classes as early as April 19, but the resumption of full-day classes will require a higher student vaccination rate, city Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor announced on Wednesday.

Explaining the timetable at the daily COVID-19 media meeting, Lam said the school reopenings will start with kindergartens and primary and international schools. Secondary schools will reopen after the core subjects' tests of the Diploma of Secondary Education (DSE) exam next month, Lam added.

Speaking at the same event, Secretary for Education Kevin Yeung Yun-hung announced that when all teachers and staff and over 90 percent of the students at a given school have had at least two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, the school will be permitted to resume full-day face-to-face classes.

Schools will be allowed to provide full-day face-to-face classes and other in-school activities for those classes that have met the vaccination requirement, he said.

Currently, about 66 percent of the city's secondary school students, from 12 to 19 years old, have received two doses of a vaccine. Only 11 percent of children aged 3 to 11 have had two shots, as they have been allowed to get vaccinated only since January.

Yeung said the government will strive to hold the DSE exam as scheduled on April 22, adding that arranging special examination venues for students in quarantine is also under consideration.

The final arrangements for the exam will be announced in early April, Yeung said.