Europe 1 with AFP 11:38 a.m., March 14, 2023

For two weeks, in Argentina, a heat wave has stunned the inhabitants of certain regions.

A school in Rosario, in the north of the country, has granted the wearing of swimsuits to its students, as it is difficult for them to withstand the rising temperatures.

An unusual initiative!

Faced with the heat wave that has been ravaging several regions of Argentina for nearly two weeks, a school in Rosario (north) has taken an unusual measure: allowing children to come in swimsuits to be able to spray them at recess, have local media reported on Monday.

The thermometer posted up to 38 degrees on Monday in the province of Buenos Aires and several north-central provinces of the country in an interminable southern summer which saw records fall one after the other: the hottest summer since the start of records (1906) for Buenos Aires, and since 1961 nationwide.

Many schools last week suspended classes for lack of air conditioning equipment, or pending an expected drop in temperatures - in principle in the second half of the week.

In an establishment in Rosario (310 km from Buenos Aires), the Francisco Gurruchaga complex, where the air conditioning cannot be used for a low voltage problem, classes have been suspended until Wednesday or Thursday in secondary school. 

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Lessons in swimsuits

But the management has innovated so as not to deprive the children of primary school of class, for whom there is often a problem of custody.

"We have decided that students (...) who so wish, will be able to attend lessons in swimsuits, sandals, with a towel and a change of clothes, and recreation will take place in the shade, with the use of a garden hose," management wrote in a letter to parents last week, quoted in Rosario's daily La Capital.

"You have to see it from a learning perspective," director Marian Sanchez told La Capital.

"We have never seen (a heat) like this, and the school must provide a response," she said.

Adding on the local channel Cadena 3 that water is used responsibly, and that if the supervisors refresh the children in small groups, "it is not a resource for playing".