Diexter Thomas
YEAR 12 teenagers will be the next year group to go back to school after months of lockdown.
They will join school year groups two, six and ten, which all went back to school on May 26.
Year 12s and Level one college students will both be going back to school on Tuesday June 16th.
The return of A-level students forms part of Phase four of ‘Unlock the Rock’ and step two of the education road-map.
All year groups from next Tuesday will be going through summer hours, which means that they will be in school for a short amount of time.
“During the period of summer hours children in Years 2 and 6 will continue to attend their school for a 2 hour session,” said the Government.
“Year 12 students will also attend double period lessons according to a subject specific timetable that has been devised expressly for this period of summer hours.”
“All of these lessons will take place in the morning and the specific timings will be communicated to parents and young people via the schools’ communication channels.”
This will be going on until the end of term on July 7, when the Childcare facilities offered by the Government will stop also.
Students who are not going back to school would be able to take advantage of the education department’s home learning system.
This home learning system will stop for Year 12 students unless they let their school know that they are unable to attend from June 16.
Youth Clubs
The Gibraltar Youth Service has also opened up its doors for young people to take advantage of their activities.
There are four youth clubs and one main youth centre on the Rock, which all provide young people the opportunity to socialise and learn new skills.
Many of their activities, events and groups have had to be cancelled, by the COVID-19 lockdown put in place in March.
They moved to video conferencing apps like Zoom to carry out activities while some children were stranded on the other side of the border.
Unlock the Rock’s Phase three made way for Youth Work to continue face-to-face in groups of 12 on an appointment basis.
Bathing boostope
With the beginning of the bathing season on June 16 will come the re-opening of the Gibraltar Bathing Pavilion and Europa Pool.
They will both be open from 10am to 8pm daily with users allowed to bring their own summer furniture and urged to keep two metres from each other.
As part of the COVID-19 measures, the pool will be set apart for the elderly on Mondays and Tuesdays and the pavilion on Wednesdays and Thursdays.
On the same date, the tuna fishing season will open once again in Gibraltar with all catches having to be registered at the port.
However, anglers are being warned not to fish in the Dolphin Protection Zone or face losing their licence.
COVID Latest
The number of total swab tests now nears 10,000, which is nearly a third of the population of Gibraltar.
The number of active cases on the Rock is now just four, down from yesterday’s five after Gibraltar left lockdown on May 23.
This means that 172 of the 176 total confirmed cases on the Rock have recovered, but infected numbers could increase after border restrictions officially eased on Wednesday.
Gibraltarians are able to cross the border to Spain as long as they have either a Blue or Red Gibraltar ID card, but not if they have a green identification card.
Spanish residents would need to show proof that they are a resident of Spain by showing a form of Identification which includes their address to go to Gibraltar.
