Should schools be reopened?
Revathi Srinivasan: I have 7,000 children in my school, and that makes me very cautious about when to open. The government has been good enough to ask for parental consent and we need at least 60 per cent of them to agree to start the school. We must start with a hybrid model as we cannot have everyone coming to school at the same time. Parents are apprehensive, it is natural; there isn't a vaccine yet. So everything will depend on parent, child and institution preparedness. I feel we have managed very well with virtual classes. We organised everything from school fests to school elections, online. While my students think they haven't missed a thing, the only thing that was truly missed was coming to school.

Dilbur Parakh: I am sure virtual learning went well for private schools, but for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, even something as simple as access to a device was a problem. When schools reopened in June, initially the learning happened on the phone, but by August we realised we had to do something about it and started a campaign called 'Back to school' to raise funds for laptops, and in some cases, phones. However, with the kind of homes they live in, to even look after the laptop is a challenge; Internet access is a problem. On the other hand, doing math and science on a simple mobile phone was almost impossible. Hence, in a broader aspect, it is important to get back to school. However, safety will be a priority and it has to be done in a staggered manner. The state government will have to step in with necessary medical and financial resources.