Students from 6 Elementary Schools Begin School Term in Makeshift Building in Quake-Stricken Japan’s Wajima City

The Yomiuri Shimbun

16:00 JST, September 2, 2024

WAJIMA, Ishikawa — As opening ceremonies were held Monday for elementary and junior high schools in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, which were damaged by the Jan. 1 Noto Peninsula Earthquake, about 400 students from six elementary schools began their second school term in a makeshift building built on the premises of the municipal Kawai Elementary School in the city.

Students from the six schools, who had been studying in a temporary building at the prefectural-run Wajima Senior High School and the city-run Wajima Junior High School, are now in the new two-story prefabricated building.

“I hope you will enjoy the new learning environment, as there is also a library and a playground,” Shigeyuki Rokuta, principal of Kawai and Oya elementary schools, told the students at the opening ceremony.

“I am looking forward to playing with friends in the new school building,” a sixth-grade student from Konosu Elementary School, 11, said with a smile.