Nkhotakota Open Secondary School Covid-19 Response

I am a teacher and active volunteer. I am studying family law in the hope that I can advocate for local bylaws under chiefs ensuring that every child attends school. I am working with teachers during COVID to support distance learners in rural Malawi.

• Resources permitting, we print customised stay-home lesson notes for our open and distance learning (ODL) students to enable them to stay home academically engaged. We also create stay-home tutorial lessons and customised notes through: Emails and WhatsApp to those who are very far away and who possess the gadgets. Through these, we disseminate factual information on COVID-19 and best practices to students and their communities in remotest parts of Nkhotakota district.
• I also plan to purchase face-masks for the students. As a Bursar for Open and Distance Learning School section, I notice students of touchingly dire need of both tuition and subsistence. I plan to use part of this money as tuition for those students who struggle to secure their fees. So this will relieve them for the rest of this year.
• Further, I plan to use part of these funds for COVID-19 Essay Competition for Open School students covering several themes on this pandemic. I will use Nkhotakota Radio to disseminate information on this Essay competition. Expert teachers will be selected to screen out the essays to find the winners. In this way, our students will be more academically engaged, stimulating their creative thinking skills.

• The impact to learning disruption due to Covid-19 School Closure will be heavily minimised especially for Form 4 Students, who have been out of school since 23rd March and who are waiting for their examinations this year, any time after the closure is lifted. Our tailor-made class notes will assist them in preparing for their National Examinations.
• By engaging our students through these academically constructive Covid-19 Essay Competition, awareness will be enhanced and achieved even to the remotest parts of the district.
• The essay competition will stimulate creative, reflective and innovative independent thinking in our students in Covid-19 perspective.
• As a Bursar for Open School administration, I see that more students will benefit from the planned portion to waive their tuition fees when school opens and the tailor-made notes prepared by Nkhotakota Secondary School experienced teaching staff.
• Essay competition advertised through our Local Radio Station will stimulate and awaken the interest in potential sponsors to do more and greater for those in the periphery of our society.