Education authorities have left it to individual principals to decide whether schools in the Nuwara Eliya and Hatton education zones open on Friday, as severe weather continues across the district.
Six schools under the Nuwara Eliya Zonal Education Office have already arranged to grant leave on Friday, zonal education director D. M. S. B. Dissanayake said, according to Hiru News.
Principals of the remaining schools have been instructed to judge conditions in their own areas and decide whether to open, then notify the zonal office of what they decide.
Hatton schools sent home early
In the Hatton zone, schools were closed ahead of scheduled times on Thursday because of heavy rainfall over the area, the report said.
Assistant Director of Education at the Hatton Zonal Education Office Wasantha Kaviraj said the same authority to decide on Friday’s opening has been delegated to principals there, and asked that any closure be reported to his office.
Context
Devolving the decision to school level is the standard response in the hill-country zones during prolonged wet spells, because conditions vary sharply between estates and valleys within a single zone — a school on a slip-prone access road may be cut off while others nearby are unaffected.
The rain that closed Hatton schools early on Thursday also brought an earth slip down onto the Hatton–Colombo main road at Watawala the same evening, and the National Building Research Organisation has red landslide warnings in force across the central hills.
Parents in both zones should expect notice from individual schools rather than a district-wide announcement.
A note on sourcing: near-identical announcements naming the same zonal director were issued during an earlier wet spell this month, so older reports of “principals to decide” in these zones refer to different dates. This report concerns Friday, September 25.
