Small Jewish, Christian primary schools to remain open

Education State Secretary Sander Dekker is keeping about 100 small schools open. This involves mostly Jewish and Christian primary schools threatened by closure in the new education law due to their small student numbers, NOS reports. The current law states that the last school of a certain "direction" in a radius of 5 kilometers must be protected and not be closed, regardless of the number of pupils. Dekker wants to make it easier to open new schools based on an educational concept rather than an ideological direction, and is thus retiring the term "direction" from education law. This means that a number of small schools currently only still open because of their direction, are now in danger of closing. After a number of complaints about the "unintended effect" of this legislative amendment, Dekker decided to make an exception for the schools that are protected under the current system, but will lose their protection when the new law takes effect. The State Secretary initially intended to keep funding these schools for another 10 years, but now agreed that they can remain open permanently. This decision was well received, especially by the Christian parties, according to NOS.