KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 12 — Around 2,500 educators nationwide have yet to be vaccinated, said Education Minister Datuk Radzi Jidin today.

He said the ministry is attempting to assign this group of teachers other roles to play during the school reopening drive.

He also said there are no rules governing school attendance among students — apart from taking classes in turn.

"The vaccination programme is moving in line with the reopening of schools. So there are no fixed guidelines as yet regarding whether to allow students with one dose or two doses to attend school.

"As for unvaccinated teachers, there are only 2,500 of them. We are looking at finding different roles for them to play with the learning-from-home programme.

"The challenges we face are the varied scenarios that arise; for example, one school has all teachers vaccinated, while another may have five, but all five are teachers of the same syllabus.

"We have to look at it on a case-by-case basis,” he said today during a press conference from Putrajaya.

"What we want to emphasise here is encouraging kids to return to school. Our aim is to create as safe a bubble as we can for them to study by mitigating the risks involved,” he added.

As for how long this system will be in place, Radzi said the ministry will monitor the education ecosystem as the situation is ever-evolving.

Meanwhile, if a suspected Covid-19 case were detected onsite, all schools will be equipped with saliva test kits to swab the student in question, who will then be placed in isolation until the health authorities arrive.

Radzi today announced that schools are set to reopen from October 3 with 50 per cent capacity in classrooms.

However, he said schools in states still under Phase 1 of the National Recovery Plan (NRP) will remain closed.

As for Phase 2, special needs schools can reopen as well as examination classes like Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM), pre-university and sports schools can reopen but also at 50 per cent capacity.