Prilep, 29 August 2023 (MIA) — The number of first graders starting school in the ten Prilep primary schools has dropped by 100, with one of the central elementary schools enrolling an average of 12 children per class, MIA's Prilep correspondent reports.

"Around 700 new students will start first grade out of the planned 800," Goce Bumbaroski, a teacher and youth advisor in the local self-government told MIA.

Also, some 300 school-age children had left local schools over the past six months to move abroad with their families, Bumbaroski said.

"This should worry us and ring the alarm for everyone to take action, both at the state institutions and all of us as individuals," he said.

Bumbaroski also said the textbook problem from last year was happening again, with the Ministry of Education not supplying enough printed textbooks to local schools.

Teachers would again have to make do with digital resources, he said, considering "we don't know how and when the textbooks will arrive or what topics and contents are covered in them." mr/