Schools Face Difficult COVID-19 Tests As Children Head Back To Class 

A teacher disinfects the hands of Kyrgyz schoolchildren on the first day of class in Bishkek on September 1. Only first-graders in Kyrgyzstan will study at school from September 1; other grades will attend classes online from home. 

Kyrgyz schoolchildren wearing protective masks maintain a distance of 1.5 meters at their school in Bishkek on September 1.

A girl and boy wear face masks on the first day of school at the Gheorghe Asachi Romanian-French Theoretical High School in the Moldovan capital, Chisinau, on September 1.

A schoolgirl has her body temperature measured on the first day of classes at the Konstantinovskaya School in Sevastopol, Crimea.

A first-grade student rings a school bell during a ceremony marking the beginning of a new academic year at Gymnasium 23 in Minsk on September 1.

Pupils wearing face masks sit in a classroom during the Day of Knowledge ceremony marking the start of classes in the Chechen capital, Grozny, on September 1.

Elementary school students wearing face masks keep their social distance on the first day of school in Sarajevo on September 1.

A Serbian primary schoolteacher prepares for the return of students in the capital, Belgrade.

Teachers prepare a classroom for teaching in Skopje on September 1. The government made a decision to postpone the start of the school year due to the current state of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was decided that all schools will begin on October 1, with debate still taking place about how classrooms will be conducted.

Students keep their distance in a class at the World International School of Turin on September 1. Ahead of the official start date of September 14, Italian schools are opening early for catch-up classes for students who fell behind in their studies during the pandemic.

Six-year old Tilda adjusts her face mask before she walks to primary school for the first time after the lockdown in Rodenbach, Germany, on August 18. German schools have been reopening since early August while the number of coronavirus cases among under-20-year-olds remained stable.

Secondary schoolchildren at Henri Matisse College in Nice, France. French teachers and pupils between 11 and 18 years old are required to wear face masks both indoors and outside.

Pupils in traditional costumes on September 1 for the first day of school in Kazan, the capital of the Russian republic of Tatarstan.

The first day of school in Kazan on September 1

Traditional ceremonies at the start of the school year were canceled in Yekaterinburg, Russia. Schools throughout Russia are taking the body temperatures of students at entrances, mostly using forehead scanners, and have deployed antiseptic sprays and lamps for disinfection.

First-grade students attend a ceremony marking the beginning of a new academic year at School No. 218 in Novosibirsk on September 1. Seventeen million students in Russia are returning to classrooms. Masks are not mandatory, but authorities are implementing a number of other health protocols.

The new school year started on August 17 in Dushanbe. Tajik teachers have complained about low attendance and have visited homes to talk to parents who are afraid to send kids to school due to the shortage of protective measures available. In some schools, RFE/RL observed the distribution of hand sanitizer and soap, but most schools are finding it difficult to enforce physical-distancing rules.

Students in Dushanbe had their temperatures taken on the first day of school on August 17.

An Afghan student attends class in the city of Herat. Schools in Afghanistan opened on August 22, with students required to wear masks. Classes are half their normal size and have been divided into two shifts.

Teachers and children observe physical distancing during an outdoor class amid the scenic Doodhpathri hill station in central Kashmir's Budgam district on August 24.

Elementary school students attend the first day of the new semester in Wuhan, China, on September 1.