The move aims to introduce students to digital tools and at the same time save them from moving around with heavy books and bags.

Last Saturday, the Algerian Minister of National Education Abdelhakim Belabed met, remotely, with government officials and education directors. During the meeting, the government officials announced the upcoming inauguration of a program aimed at digitalizing textbooks.

 "More than 3 million third, fourth and fifth grade pupils will be ridden of the textbooks, that add weight to their school bags, thanks to measures approved by the President of the Republic, Mr. Abdelmadjid Tebboune,” said Minister Abdelhakim Belabed while urging officials to make it easy for parents to acquire the digital textbooks.

In Algeria, the issue of the weight of school bags comes up every back-to-school time.  Unions that deem the weight too heavy for students (because notably of the textbooks) have repeatedly called for a review of the educational program.

Last September, the Minister of National Education said that several "unprecedented measures" had been taken by the government to find definitive solutions to the problem. The most important of those solutions is the provision of electronic tablets to more than 1600 schools across the country.

Thanks to the tablets, students will access the digital version of their textbooks free of charge. They will access also additional resources such as videos, audio, animations, and interactive features.

The measures were included in the government program approved by the parliament. They are part of the project initiated to generalize the use of tablet computers in schools, starting from the 2022/2023 school year that kicked off in September 2022.  

Samira Njoya