EXCEPT FOR THE HEAT, SCHOOL OPENING SMOOTH / 143,000 CLASS ROOMS NEEDED
[PHOTO COURTESY OF THE EARTHBAG BUILDING.COM]
MANILA, JUNE 8, 2011 (STAR) By Rainier Allan Ronda - Despite the discomfort brought by the hot weather and the usual problem of congestion in many public schools, yesterday's opening of classes went smoothly, Education Secretary Armin Luistro said.
"In general, I'm very happy with how things went so far," Luistro told The STAR in an interview at the Department of Education (DepEd) central office in Ortigas, Pasig City.
"In a general sense, we were faced with the usual problems. But we were much prepared to address those problems," Luistro said.
Yesterday was the first time that Luistro oversaw the opening of classes as head of DepEd.
Luistro said he was glad that many schools, like at the P. Gomez Elementary School in Santa Cruz, Manila and San Juan Elementary School in San Juan City, which he visited, teachers were able to start their lessons right away.
"That's what's great to see, teachers starting teaching students their lessons right on the first day of school," Luistro said.
He said the primary problem that again faced DepEd was congestion in many schools in Metro Manila, citing reports that some school principals packed classrooms with up to 60 to 100 students.
Many schools also have double or even triple shifts to decongest classes to more manageable sizes, he said.
"Some arranged for school buses to take the students that cannot be accommodated to the nearest school that has space for them," he added.
He said the "surprise" huge turnout of students in a number of Metro Manila schools was also because the students and their parents did not enroll their children during the early registration held by DepEd as early as last January and during the summer vacation.
"We'll deal with this problem in a week's time. They can wait for one week, anyway, they made us wait for six months," Luistro said.
He said he would discuss the matter with Elena Ruiz, DepEd National Capital Region officer-in-charge.
DepEd expected a total enrolment of 25.7 million students nationwide, 22.05 million or 86 percent of which are in public schools and an estimated 3.65 million are in private schools.
Of the total enrollees, 7.73 million are high school students, with 5.85 million in public schools and 1.88 million in private schools; 15.47 million are elementary pupils, with 14.25 million in public schools and 1.22 million in private schools.
DepEd also expected about 1.93 million kindergarten pupils under the universal kindergarten program.
The universal kindergarten program will be the initial phase of DepEd's ambitious "K" or Kindergarten + 12 Basic Education Curriculum program which aims to add an additional two year of senior high school to the current 10 year BEC with only six years of elementary and four years of high school level.
'No major crimes'
National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) chief Director Alan Purisima said the five police districts received no incidence of major crimes from policemen and government officials in public elementary and high schools in the metropolis.
"What we received were the normal complaints during the opening of classes like the missing names and classrooms of students," Purisima said. "There's no crime incident reported as yet."
At least 2,445 policemen and 3,305 force multipliers were deployed starting 4 a.m. yesterday in 1,063 schools in Metro Manila to prevent crimes and ease the flow of traffic. With Non Alquitran
Phl schools lack more than 143,000 classrooms this year By Jess Diaz (The Philippine Star) Updated June 08, 2011 12:00 AMComments (1)
MANILA, Philippines - The public school system lacks 143,281 classrooms this year, Aurora Rep. Juan Edgardo Angara said yesterday.
Angara, who chairs the House committee on technical and higher education, said the government plans to ease the severe classroom shortage by leasing 16,051 classrooms from private schools through tuition vouchers and by building 14,243 rooms.
However, the money for the construction of new classrooms was affected by the decision of the administration's economic managers to tighten infrastructure spending in the first four months of the year, he said.
"Government disbursed only P34.8 billion for infrastructure, an amount that is 53 percent – or almost P40 billion – lower than what was spent during the same period last year and an anemic 14 percent of the current full-year program," he said.
He added that the early passage of the 2011 budget in December 2010 should have given the government a head start in construction, which would have also allowed it to take advantage of the good construction weather in the first half of the year.
"Unfortunately, the government forfeited this advantage when it slowed down spending for infrastructure in the first four months," he stressed.
Government officials justified the cautious release of infrastructure funds to the recalibration of bidding processes to weed out wastage and corruption.
Angara said the construction of new classrooms should have been spared from the new policy on infrastructure spending. "Education should have been spared because the building of a classroom is not the Three Gorges Dam project that would require complicated engineering and financial review."
Perhaps fearing that fiscal austerity would drag down economic growth, government reopened the spigots for infrastructure funds last month, with the budget department announcing on May 9 that it has released P7 billion to the Department of Education for the repair of 8,997 classrooms.
Angara said the release of the money 28 days before last Monday's resumption of classes, meant that "only a few classrooms were ready for school opening."
Still, he lauded the decision to release the funds, saying, "It means the money is already there and although delayed, it is the biggest allocation in history."
He said a catch-up school building program by DepEd could reverse the effects of the delay "and this should be its priority as an estimated 1.14 million students - on two shifts of 40 per class - will benefit from the new 14,243 classrooms."
He also called for the release of whatever balance is left in the P11.3-billion lump sum in the 2011 national budget for the requirements of the public school system.
Angara said public schools also lack 101,612 teachers, 2.72 million chairs, 119,296 toilets, and 66.63 million textbooks.
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