A successful campaign on blogs and Internet chat rooms among pupils in Bahrain resulted in attendance levels as low as 10 percent in some schools at the end of last week, and the students who did show up displayed very little interest in their studies, the news agency ArabianBusiness.com reported.
Most students has been on holiday from Sunday to Wednesday last week and were supposed to return to school for one day on Thursday before being off for two days as usual on Friday and Saturday, as is common in the Muslim world where the two days are the equivalent of a weekend.
According to the news agency, public schools had sent out text messages to parents reminding them that their children were supposed to show up for school on Thursday. However, most schools reported that an overwhelming majority of their pupils were absent.
Even though Bahrain introduced free public education in 1919 and the first all-boys school was established by wealthy merchants, until then the only kind of formal education in the small island kingdom had been Quranic schools.
The first school for girls was opened in 1928, but due to economic hardship the schools came under governmental control in 1930.
The school education system, which is mandatory, is divided into three stages: primary school lasts for six years followed by intermediate level for three years. Secondary school is separated into general, industrial or commercial fields and lasts for three years.
The primary and secondary curricula include a nine-year course in religious studies.