Overblog
Editer l'article Suivre ce blog Administration + Créer mon blog
Le blog de fukushima-is-still-news

information about Fukushima published in English in Japanese media info publiée en anglais dans la presse japonaise

Keep the schools open?

March 7, 2014

 

 

Education chief backs Fukushima schools but municipalities face many hurdles

 

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20140307p2a00m0na009000c.html 

 

Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Minister Hakubun Shimomura says the government will give serious thought to plans by municipalities in Fukushima Prefecture's Futaba County to keep their elementary and junior high schools open despite a decline in enrollment in the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.


"It's important to give consideration," Shimomura said in a recent interview with the Mainichi Shimbun. He added that adults should think more seriously about the fact that children in regions hard hit by the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami and subsequent nuclear disaster have not been able to return to their hometowns for three years.


He made a strong pledge to support a scheme by a council of eight towns and villages in the county and the Fukushima prefectural and central governments to establish a combined junior high and high school in the form of startup appropriations and curriculum compilation.


While acknowledging that a consolidation of elementary and junior high schools across Japan will continue due to the nation's declining birthrate, Shimomura said that schools in Futaba County are another story and that the government will take into account municipalities' desires to keep their schools.

 

Only about 10 percent of elementary and junior high school students in the county who evacuated to other parts of Japan following the meltdowns at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant have returned home. If schools in the county shut down, households with children won't be able to return home, jeopardizing the very survival of local governments per se.


Meanwhile, moves are under way to set up a combined junior high and high school, but evacuees are gradually taking root in relocated locations and a sense of hometown loss among children is becoming a reality.


Three mini schools under the jurisdiction of Futaba County will start class this spring, reflecting local determination to keep the local community alive.


The town of Futaba relocated its town hall and many of its residents to the city of Kazo in Saitama Prefecture, about 200 kilometers away, after the nuclear crisis struck. It will resume schooling at elementary and junior high school level in the Fukushima Prefecture city of Iwaki in April with four students each. There were a total of 551 elementary and junior high school students in Futaba before the nuclear disaster.


A 41-year-old nuclear power plant worker who is living in the Fukushima Prefecture town of Hirono away from his family has decided to move his family from Niigata Prefecture to Iwaki. His 10-year-old son will attend the makeshift Futaba Kita Elementary School. The son had stopped going to school in Niigata.


The man said, "I had to take action. I want him to work hard at a school with many students but I also want him to make up for lost time with a small number of fellow students." There are many students who have returned home after failing to familiarize themselves with evacuated locations or being bullied. Local teachers who have first-hand knowledge of them are vital to the children.


Another example of resumed schooling concerns the town of Namie, also near the crippled nuclear power plant. The town opened an elementary school and junior high school in the Fukushima Prefecture city of Nihonmatsu in August 2011 after consolidating six elementary schools and three junior high schools. There were 28 elementary school students and 33 junior high school students then, accounting for only 3 percent of the pre-disaster enrollment. The combined number of elementary and junior high school students totals 58 during the current school year. The town-run Tsushima Elementary School reopened at the temporary school complex this spring to accept three brothers -- a second-grader, a fifth-grader and a sixth-grader.


Kiichiro Hatakeyama, superintendent of the Namie Municipal Board of Education, said the town wanted to reopen all schools, adding it will be difficult for students to return to their former schools if the situation remains the same.

But the reality is very harsh. The town of Tomioka reopened four elementary and junior high schools and a kindergarten by renovating factory facilities in the town of Miharu six months after the nuclear meltdowns but came under fire from town residents for taking such action too late.


The combined enrollment at the four elementary and junior high schools totals 64. But there will be no first-graders at the two elementary schools in the coming school year.


The village of Katsurao resumed schooling at elementary and junior high level on the premises of a former school in Miharu in April last year. But there will be no new entrant at the elementary school in the coming school year.


The town of Naraha resumed schooling in Iwaki in April 2012 and about 20 percent of town school students returned.


But the number of new elementary and junior high school students in the coming school year totals only 33, compared with 37 prospective graduates.


The town of Okuma succeeded in resuming schooling in the Fukushima Prefecture city of Aizuwakamatsu only one month after the outbreak of the nuclear crisis thanks to the full cooperation of the city's education board. But there have been a growing number of families with children who have relocated to Iwaki, closer to their hometown than Aizuwakamatsu, since last year. They are doing so because they can no longer stand life in unfamiliar environs. The combined number of students at two elementary schools and one junior high school comes to 284 now but will dwindle to 197 in the coming school year.


Toshihide Takeuchi, superintendent of the Okuma Municipal Board of Education, said the town made the right decision to reopen schools to lead townspeople as an initial response to the nuclear disaster. But as the days have gone by, schoolchildren have relocated to places where their parents work. He expressed regret that the town simultaneously should have reopened its schools and created jobs for parents.

Partager cet article
Repost0
Pour être informé des derniers articles, inscrivez vous :
Commenter cet article