Yellow alert halts lessons: when schools are allowed to hold lessons in shelters

During the “yellow” threat level classes in schools are suspended, and students and staff must move to a shelter. If the institution has an equipped room where it is safe to stay, the educational process may be resumed there.

Education Ombudsperson Nadiya Leshchyk explained that if the shelter’s capacity is insufficient, the school must organize classes so that the number of people remaining in the building does not exceed the shelter’s capacity.

The educational process is interrupted and everyone proceeds to the shelter. If possible — the educational process is resumed in the shelter, — said Nadiya Leshchyk.

The principal determines the class format together with teachers, taking into account the capabilities of the specific institution. This may include:

• blended learning;
• shift-based lessons;
• in-person classes for certain grades, while other students study remotely.

Do teachers have to go to school during an air-raid alert

Nadiya Leshchyk emphasized that employees cannot be forced to travel to the educational institution during an air-raid alert. The employer has no right to require an employee to leave a safe place if this would endanger their life or health.

The Ombudsperson also drew attention to incidents when, during alerts, education department staff checked whether teachers were at their workplaces.

Parents are advised to find out in advance whether teachers are present at the school and whether the institution can take their child into the shelter. This decision should be made taking the security situation into account.

Mobile shelters are proposed to be installed on routes to schools

Separately, Nadiya Leshchyk urged that the safety of the route to school be taken into account. For this, in particular, mobile shelters can be used at stops and in places where people gather.

Such shelters, she said, should be the responsibility of the community, not of the educational institution.

Within the framework of the project “Safe Route for Schoolchildren”, initiated by the Office of the President, it is planned to install 840 mobile shelters on roads to schools in frontline regions.

On September 4 the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine approved new rules for responding to air threats.

Previously we wrote:

• Children “on each other’s heads”: Finally Senkevych ordered checks of school shelters after parents’ complaints
• In the Korabelnyi district of Mykolaiv, an underground space was equipped for a kindergarten and a gymnasium
• Yellow or red: the air alert format in the Mykolaiv region has changed
• More than 8,000 children remained on distance learning: how Mykolaiv schools operate
• In Mykolaiv, 45 schools began in-person classes