TENNIS South Africa (TSA) hosted a successful clinic in Atteridgeville, Tshwane this past week, in the build-up to the highly anticipated second edition of the BNP Paribas RCS Rising Star Tennis series, which starts later this month.

Over 70 children from schools in Atteridgeville, Hammanskraal, Mabopane, Soshanguve and Ga-Rankuwa participated in the programme held at Mpho Makhoba Tennis Precinct, situated in the Mbolekwa Sports Complex.

Tennis equipment (rackets and balls) were donated to the participating schools to help them gear up for the nationwide Rising Star Tennis school’s tournament.

Six coaches from the BNP Paribas Coaches Mentorship programme, conducted the coaching clinic in Atteridgeville as part of TSA’s goal to provide opportunities and skill development to kids from historically disadvantaged communities.

Vikas Khandelwal, CEO of BNP Paribas South Africa, who attended the clinic expressed his satisfaction with the success of the Atteridgeville clinic. “Tennis is embedded in BNP Paribas’ DNA, and this initiative has an even greater impact than sport alone. Rising Star Tennis is bringing communities together during a time when it’s needed the most, giving children an opportunity to learn and have fun which is more important than ever right now.”

Programme ambassador Carol Tshabalala also took to the court to hit some balls with the enthusiastic young players, while South African teen sensation and programme ambassador Kholo Montsi conducted a virtual masterclass session from Florida in the United States.

“I’m honoured to be part of this project (Rising Star Tennis),” said Montsi, who competed in the junior division at last year’s French Open.

“I think it’s something very special and for me it’s great to be able to help other kids in South Africa. It’s an amazing opportunity and I’m blessed to be part of it.”

The 18-year-old Montsi shared some invaluable tennis tips with the kids to help them prepare for the BNP Paribas RCS Rising Star Tennis tournament.

Entries for the second edition of the national schools’ tournament close on 5 April, 2021 and district events will be held around the country this month.

“This year is bigger and better than ever. We’ve got primary schools, high schools and a wheelchair tennis competition,” said TSA CEO, Richard Glover.

“The objective is to get more kids across all communities across South Africa playing tennis. This is a really exciting celebration of grassroots tennis.”

The next BNP Paribas RCS Rising Star Tennis activation will take place in Gqeberha, Eastern Cape on Tuesday, 6 April, followed by another clinic in Polokwane, Limpopo on Thursday, 8 April 2021.

• Supersport

SCHOOLS worldwide offer interconnected formal and informal services to children and young people. These services focus not only on academic achievement but on social, emotional, psychological, and physical health and well-being.

By providing physical protection and oversight, daily routines, and stability, as well as services for health, nutrition, sanitation, and other more specialized needs, education can both sustain and save lives, particularly in crisis-affected, post-crisis, and refugee-hosting countries.

Access to quality education in crisis-affected contexts provides hope for a better future by equipping children and young people with the tools they need to reach their full potential and experience life-long success.

With the rapid closure of schools across the world in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, children and young people, especially those in crisis-affected contexts, have lost an important space that offered them stability, even as the environment around them grew ever more uncertain.

The economic shocks caused by COVID-19 have had devastating consequences by compounding the poverty and food insecurity many families were already facing, including those in contexts enduring pre-existing challenges.

The mental health of adults and children alike has deteriorated as they have been confined to their homes; government and non-government agencies alike have reported a significant increase in violence and other threats that specifically target children and young people.

Drawing from research and experience on previous infectious disease outbreaks and an emergent body of work from the current COVID-19 pandemic, this report highlights the primarily negative effects resulting from the combination of sudden school closures and restricted access to and availability of services, social networks, and other protective facilities for children and young people living in crisis-affected contexts.

The consequences of school closures on education and child protection can be categorized into three principal areas.

LOSS OF LEARNING AND IMPEDIMENTS TO PROVIDING INCLUSIVE, EQUITABLE,
QUALITY EDUCATION

School closures are having a significant negative influence on academic attainment and on social and emotional learning (SEL). To mitigate the loss of face-to-face instruction, education stakeholders have attempted to rapidly disseminate online and other distance learning resources, including lessons offered on the internet, television, and radio, as well as printed study materials. Analysis of these global efforts has produced several key findings.

• The content and quality of distance education varies widely, even within a country, and children’s ability to engage in learning depends heavily on the resources and support available in individual households.
• Many learners are struggling to access distance learning options, due to barriers related to information and communications technology, infrastructure, and digital literacy.
• Challenges in access to and the availability of education have been exacerbated for children and young people living in crisis-affected and post-crisis contexts, as well as those from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
• Accessibility for children and young people with disabilities has been extremely limited across available distance learning platforms, many of which were not designed to be inclusive.
• Other groups of children and young people have also been marginalized; girls in particular are less able to engage with the distance education offered, due to their household duties.
• Across contexts, parental engagement—including their individual availability, level of education, ability or willingness to support their children’s learning at home while juggling multiple priorities—is a significant factor in the success or failure of remote learning modalities.
• Without daily face-to-face contact with teachers, children and young people lose not only their teachers’ pedagogical expertise in facilitating participation and engagement with the content, including SEL, they also lose dependable routines and protective oversight.

NEGATIVE IMPACT ON CHILD WELL-BEING AND HEALTHY DEVELOPMENT

Schools are hubs for social services beyond academic learning, many of which encourage the enrollment and retention of children and young people who might otherwise be excluded from education. Critical services curtailed or lost due to school closures include the following:

• At the peak of school closures, an estimated 396 million children and young people worldwide lacked access to school-based nutrition and nutritional supplement programs, which both combat malnutrition and incentivize parents to enroll their children in school, especially girls.
• Children and young people with disabilities have lost access to specialized or rehabilitative care. This encompasses differentiated academic support and clinical services, which these children and young people disproportionately require. Outside the schools, such services are out of reach for families living in poverty.
• Children and young people lack access to the formal mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) services often provided in schools; integrating these services into the school day prevents stigmatization of those with mental health issues and “normalizes” the healing process, in particular for refugee children and young people.
• School closures mean children and young people have lost important informal social amenities and safeguards, many of which are difficult to quantify yet are crucial to ensuring children’s and young people’s well-being and healthy development. Relationships with their peers and teachers can promote positive mental health, and the schools provide entry points into social networks for both pupils and their parents. This is particularly important for marginalized groups, such as lesbian, gay, transgender, queer, and/or intersex (LGBTQI) youth.

AMPLIFIED CHILD PROTECTION RISKS AND HARMS EXPERIENCED BY CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE

Schools aim to provide physical and emotional security and dependable routines for children, young people, and their families, especially in crisis-affected nations.

During school hours, children are productively occupied, and they are supervised by teachers and school administrators who have safeguarding responsibilities. During the lockdowns, the home or community has not been a place of safety for many children and young people, thus the child protection risks have multiplied, compounded by growing economic uncertainty, health-related concerns, and other domestic burdens:

• There is growing evidence that dealing with a lack of routine and the structured activity schools provide creates negative feelings among children and young people, including a sense of isolation, all of which have severe effects on their mental health, particularly for those with existing MHPSS needs.
• Research across child protection agencies worldwide shows a significant decrease in the availability of social support services, even as hotlines report increasing instances of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), child abuse, child labor, and other forms of exploitation and neglect.
• In situations of armed conflict, the absence of school has deprived children and young people of the incentives that help them avoid enlisting in the armed forces. This creates a heightened risk of the recruitment and use of children and young people by armed forces and armed groups, which disproportionately target boys.
• As families suffer pandemic-related economic shocks, children and young people are more vulnerable to engaging in hazardous and exploitative labor.
• Refugee children and young people are often those most educationally and economically deprived. This includes having limited access to formal education, fewer opportunities for remote learning, and a higher risk of abandoning their education to enter the workplace.
• Evidence suggests that there have been significant setbacks in recent progress toward gender equality, especially for girls, who are more likely to report that household duties prevent them from engaging in remote learning. Confronted with home confinement in a context of economic uncertainty, girls—especially adolescents—are at increased risk of child, early, and forced marriage (CEFM) and other forms of SGBV. Moreover, because schools are closed, which limits monitoring and reporting, cases of female genital mutilation and cutting (FGM/C) are on the rise since the start of the pandemic.
• With schools closed, children and young people with disabilities face acute risks. Their need for care at home may put additional stress on parents or caregivers accustomed to the support offered through the schools, and experts warn of increasing abuse and neglect of children and young people with disabilities.
• Across all groups, the abuse suffered during school closures will likely have long-term consequences: in addition to causing significant mental health issues, sexual abuse can lead to sexually transmitted infections, unwanted pregnancies, and life-threatening complications while giving birth.

In sum, school closures have been shown to have a hugely negative impact on children and young people, immediately and in the long-term.

Looking ahead, the situation for vulnerable children and young people worldwide remains fragile. Before the pandemic, 127 million children and young people of primary and secondary school age were already out of school. The outbreak of COVID-19 put additional stress on already over-extended and under-resourced education systems around the world. Context-specific risks may prevent or delay the reopening of some schools, in particular those that have been the target of attacks or used as temporary housing during the crisis. However, even as schools reopen, there is the risk that children and young people from some marginalized populations will be excluded from re-enrollment or opt out of attending school because they need to work or have been married and/or become pregnant. Others will struggle to re-engage with schooling as they deal with the long-term effects of violence, abuse, neglect, and exploitation.

RECOMMENDATIONS

When confronted with the ongoing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and future infectious disease outbreaks or other emergencies, policymakers must ensure that children and young people remain squarely at the center of their decision-making. Before future school closings occur, officials must strive to understand and weigh up the multitude of risks children and young people can and will face, along with the wider public health prerogatives.

The following key recommendations outline how best to respond to and recover from COVID-19 school closures and to prepare for future shocks:

• Prioritize the identification of the most marginalized children and young people in each context, then address the systemic barriers that prevent their engagement with education and access to protective services.
• To prevent children and young people from “falling through the cracks,” strengthen child protection and education systems and improve collaboration between stakeholders, prioritizing support for children and young people already out of school.
• As schools reopen, emphasize outreach to the children and young people from marginalized and less-visible groups, who are most at risk of not returning or were already out of school.
• As schools reopen, prioritize access and well-being over rapid academic catch-up.
• Moving forward, provide ongoing training and strengthen the capacity of teachers and school administrators, as well as parents and caregivers, to support children’s and young people with their at-home learning, and their wider MHPSS needs.
• Provide more equitable remote learning by strengthening education systems, reviewing existing materials and media, and developing new materials that are appropriate, learner centered, and useful for at-home learning.
• Ensure that scholastic materials and distance learning modalities feature inclusive options for children and young people with a variety of disabilities.
• Engage in ongoing planning and preparedness for future school closures in emergency situations, including improving water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) facilities, reducing class sizes to accommodate social distancing, and improving resiliency and readiness to shift to distance modalities.
• Increase predictable financing for education and child protection, including humanitarian and development aid.
• Reliefweb

SPORTS, choirs and tournaments are permitted again at schools following an amendment to Covid-19 directions by the Department of Basic Education.

The signed amendment, dated 27 March, gives the go-ahead for school sports matches, physical education, extra-curricular activities, and inter-school, district, provincial and national school sport tournaments.

However, the conditions are tough, with no spectators allowed and a host of other rules that must be adhered to.

These are:

• A Covid-19 compliance officer must be appointed for each venue;
• There must only be one controlled entrance to the venue;
• All participants must undergo health and temperature screening before warm-up or the event;
• Any person who enters the venue must undergo health and temperature screening;
• Hand sanitisers must be available at the entrance gate and every person who enters the venue must sanitise their hands;
• Participants and officials must sanitise their hands before and after a match or event;
• A person who leaves the venue temporarily and returns again, must redo the process of health and temperature screening, and hand sanitising;
• For contact tracing, a register of all officials and pupils from visiting and hosting schools who are attending a school match or event must be kept by the hosting school for at least 21 days. It must contain the following information of officials and pupils:
• Full names; residential address; cellphone number, telephone number or email address; and, contact details of the people living in the same residence as the person attending training or a school match or event;
• A digital registration and health screening platform, such as the Teacher Connect Application, may also be used to assist with the administration of the registration process;
• If a person has Covid-19 symptoms or presents with a temperature above 38°C, that person must be refused access into the venue;
• The number of people, including participants, referees, adjudicators, technical officials, volunteers, medical team, media or broadcasting team, and stadium workers, permitted at a venue at any one time is limited to: A maximum of 100 people, for indoor venues; A maximum of 250 people for outdoor venues;
• If the venue is too small to hold 100 people indoors or 250 persons outdoors, observing a distance of at least 1.5m from each other, then not more than 50% of the capacity of the venue may be used, subject to strict adherence to all health protocols and social distancing measures;
• Teams, technical officials, volunteers, relevant stadium staff, medical staff and registered members of the media or broadcaster team must leave the venue as soon as their responsibilities are completed. Social distancing and the wearing of face masks must always be maintained by people not participating in matches or events;
• Participants must always wear face masks, except when participating in an event;
• Technical officials must report before the start of any event or competition for Covid-19 regulations and protocol briefing session and screening;
• All ablution facilities must be sanitised regularly and kept clean as per Covid-19 protocols; entry to the ablution area will be regulated to adhere to social distancing protocols; and all sport equipment must be sanitised before and after use;
• Championships, tournaments and inter-school sport matches that require learners to travel to other schools or provinces may resume without spectators;
• A list of names of all officials, pupils and any other person from the visiting school must be provided to the hosting school at least three days before an event or match, for the purposes of compliance;
• Oral history, spelling bees, moot court, speech contests, debates and school clubs may resume activities, without spectators with strict adherence to social distancing, hygiene and safety measures;
• Choir practice or rehearsals, choir competitions and inter-school choir events may resume, without spectators;
• In order to comply with the venue capacity, the categories permitted to participate in respect of the South African Choral Eisteddfod (SASCE) are limited to small ensembles, farm schools, special schools, female and male voices.

• Agencies