But now there is help to be had. In any case, the National Association of Local Authorities (KL) states that the municipalities can now also enter into a dialogue with private and independent schools about lightning tests.
This happens after the Ministry of Health has clarified that there is a legal basis for cooperating with the private schools.
KL chairman Jacob Bundsgaard (S) emphasizes that private and independent schools must in principle take care of the employees themselves, but it is good that the municipalities can now help, he says.
– There has been no legal basis until we have clarified it. Some municipalities are already far in the collaboration, but the clarification is only there now. That’s good and we’re ready to lend a hand.
– But it is probably also important to state that just as the employees in the primary school are the responsibility of the municipalities, so the employees in the private schools are the responsibility of the private schools, so they have a responsibility to help find a solution, says Jacob Bundsgaard.
Question: Do you basically think here under corona that private and independent schools should have the same help as primary school?
– I think the independent schools must make sure that their employees are tested, and we would like to help with that. It is extremely important that they take on that task and take on that responsibility, in the same way as the primary and lower secondary schools have taken it on, says Jacob Bundsgaard.
Free and private schools have so far been responsible for hiring testers or using their own staff. They can get help with training through the municipality. But it will thus be the independent and private schools’ own responsibility to ensure testing.
The difference met with criticism from Denmark’s Private Schools and the Free Schools Teachers’ Association in the media Skolemonitor.
On Thursday, criticism also spread to Christiansborg. The Unity List’s Peder Hvelplund emphasized, for example, that “viruses do not care whether it is spread in a primary or a free school”.
According to the Ministry of Children and Education, by 2020 there were 1080 primary and lower secondary schools in Denmark and 551 independent schools and private schools in Denmark.
Source: The Nordic Page