About 1.7 million students return to schools

Amman — Sunday marked the beginning of the second academic semester, with around 1.7 million students returning to the classrooms.

Education Ministry spokesperson Ahmad Masaafah, said that around 115,000 public school teachers and administrators returned to the Kingdom’s 4073 public schools to welcome students. 

“The total number of school students in Jordan is estimated to be 2.250,000,” he said.

In remarks to The Jordan Times, the official said that classes in private schools are expected to resume at the beginning of February. “The total number of teachers and administrators working at private education establishments is nearly 50,000, while around 550,000 students go to private schools in Jordan.”

“The number of students attending public or private schools is not drastically changing,” Masaafah said, underlining that switching from one school to another is usually done throughout a two-week period prior to the beginning of a new school semester.

Back in 2021, over 130,000 students transferred from private to public schools, due to switching to distance education and the difficult financial circumstances during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The changes in the scholastic calendar this semester were due to the ministry’s implementation of the national programme addressing student learning loss, which requires increasing the length of the academic period, he said.