New school year, same old problem

CEBU, Philippines - Public schools welcomed a new school year yesterday, but face the same problems.

While there were no major hitches in the school opening, the perennial problem on the lack of classrooms continue to hound schools around Cebu and even the region.

Classes in most private schools are scheduled to start next week yet.

Classes in tents

In Cebu City, the opening of classes in both elementary and secondary schools was generally peaceful and orderly even to some pupils of Busay Elementary School, who continue to hold classes in tents until they are provided with a new building.

Their old building which was built beside a steep slope has been declared unsafe, because blasting activities in a nearby subdivision development site that caused earth movement.

There are five sections holding classes under tents, two grade one classes, two grade three classes and one grade two class. They have been holding classes in tents since January.

Relocation

Department of Education - Cebu City Division Superintendent Dr. Rhea Mar Angtud said that Busay Elementary School is one of the two schools in Cebu City they are planning to relocate.

Angtud said they are presently scouting for new sites for the schools in Busay and Sapangdaku because their locations are considered danger areas.

Sapangdaku Elementary School is located beside the river and is always flooded during heavy rains.

Other than these two schools, the other schools earlier reported ‘unsafe’ have already been repaired and corrected. The problems in the school buildings in Sirao and Toong have been rectified by their contractors.

DepEd-Cebu City is also facing a challenge on the workbooks for the grade 1 pupils and grade 7 students.

Angtud said that they are still reproducing workbooks using their resources because the budget from the national office has not been released.

She also assured that Cebu City is not experiencing shortage in classrooms and armchairs.

The Cebu City Government who heads the Local School Board has about P90 million worth of school building projects which will build over 136 new classrooms in the future.

The P90-million worth of projects is due for implementation soon. The budget is sourced from the P100 million appropriations for school buildings included by Mayor Michael Rama during the Supplemental Budget No. 5 in 2010.

Packed rooms

But in Abellana National School, the biggest high school in the city, rooms are filled with 60 students per class because of the continuous increase in their student population.

Heidi Rodriguez, OIC Principal of Abellana National School said that the ideal number of students per classroom is supposedly 45 students only.

But the increasing number of enrollees each year is compelling them to put more students per class.

Abellana National School recorded an initial increase of 10 percent this year.

Angtud said that there is an average of two percent increase in the enrollment rate citywide. Last school year’s number of enrollees is 49, 224 in both day and night secondary schools and 104,044 in elementary which are two percent higher this year.

She said that there is also an increase in the number of transferees from private to public schools due to the tuition fee increase in the private schools.

Around the region

The same problems hound other parts of Central Visayas.

DepEd-7 regional director Carmelita Dulangon said that she is happy that school children were excited to go back to school.

She said that parents, barangay, city and municipal officials were in full force to ensure for an orderly and peaceful opening of classes.

DepEd-7 estimates that for this school year, there will be a total of 1.6 million students and pupils enrolled for Region VII. Last year’s was a total of 1,582,046 enrollees.

Dulangon said that since classes yesterday were already in full swing, those who enrolled were ask to go to the principal’s office for enrollment in order not to disturb the classes.

“Full swing na gyud atong klase gahapon and I am so glad nga gikuyugan gyud sa mga parents ang atong mga gagmay nga mga bata,” (Our classes went full swing yesterday and I am so glad the parents went with their children) she said.

Collection of fees

Meanwhile, DepEd has come up with more specific guidelines on non-collection of fees in public schools to serve as guide for school officials and parents.

DepEd secretary Armin Luistro, in a press statement said that the education department can only encourage more parents to bring their children to school if they are not intimidated by school fees.

He urged all school officials to strictly observe these guidelines under the pain of administrative sanctions.

In a statement released by the Public Information Agency, in DepEd Order 41 series of 2012, Luistro directed all school officials that no fees shall be collected from school children in kindergarten up to Grade 4 anytime during school year 2012-2013.

For Grade 5 pupils up to fourth year high school students, there will be no collection from June to July 2012.

However, starting August 2012 until the end of school year 2013, the following fees may be collected on a voluntary basis — Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts membership fees of P50 per learner; Philippine National Red Cross, P35 per learner; Anti-TB fund drive of P5 per learner; school publication fee of P60 for every elementary pupils and P90 for every high school student.

The Parents-Teachers Association fee must be reasonable and is to be determined during the PTA general assembly.

The order further stated that no teacher, school officials and personnel shall collect fees/contributions nor shall they be entrusted with the safekeeping and disbursement of collections made by the PTA pursuant to the Code of Ethics for Professional Teachers.

In Mandaue

DepEd Mandaue City Division Administrator Benjamin Tiongzon yesterday said that the first day of school went on smoothly because they implemented the automatic enrollment for those, who are promoted to the next grade level and only those who are incoming kindergarten, grade 1 and first year in high school are obliged to enroll.

He said the names of the students are already posted in the walls outside their classrooms thus it was just easy for the pupil and students to locate their classrooms.

Tiongzon said that although they are expecting the increase of students, but they can only give the percentage after June as enrollment for both elementary and high school will be until June 30 so that transferees could also be given the ample time.

He also said that as of the moment, Mandaue city schools division still lacks a total of 280 classrooms.

There are, however, on-going building projects while in some places like Cubabcub Elementary School, the parents have initiated to build makeshift classrooms for the students.

In other schools, the teachers decided to do a double shift in order to accommodate all students and answer the problem on the lack of classrooms.

Aside from classrooms, Mandaue also needs at least 200 teachers to comply with the ratio of 1 teacher to 45 students.

But according to Tiongzon, they have not yet received the “Notice of Organization, Staffing & Compensation Action (NOSCA) from the Department of Budget and Management (DBM), which could be the basis for hiring.

In Lapu-Lapu city

City Schools Division Superintendent Eduardo Ompad said that the lack of classrooms is one of the problems that the Department of Education and the city government of Lapu-Lapu are trying to address.

Lapu-Lapu City needs at least 500 classrooms to accommodate the increasing number of enrollees from the 30 barangays.

According to Ompad, Mayor Paz Radaza assured him that the city government will prioritize the construction of new classrooms once the funds available especially those allocated from Special Education Fund.

Peaceful

Cebu Provincial Police Office director Sr. Supt. Patrocinio Comendador said the first day of classes was generally peaceful.

Comendador inspected the southern Cebu area yesterday morning including Calajo-an Elementary School in Barangay Calajo-an, Minglanilla where Ellah Joy Pique was abducted in February 8, 2011.

Pique was found dead the next day at a cliff in Barili town.

He said that schools should also have security guards because the police also have some important matters to attend to.

Comendador also said that he is worried about the safety of the students who go to schools situated along the national highway due to the reckless drivers.

Cebu City Police Office Director Melvin Ramon Buenafe said the first day of classes was generally peaceful throughout the city.

Buenafe said they were no threats to the peace and order anywhere in the city as thousands of students return to school.

He said his men were in their posts as early as 6:30 a.m. yesterday to assist students and their parents.

School security guards were very strict in allowing their student from going home without their parents or guardians.

Supt. Armando Radoc, Officer-In-Charge the Regional Police Community Relations, said they have identified at least three top priority schools in Cebu City based on violent incident involving students in the past — Tejero Elementary School, Zapatera Elementary School, and City Central School.

Buenafe said traffic was one of the most evident problems they have seen in areas where schools are situated near national highways. — with Jose Sollano, Flor Perolina, Ria Mae Booc, and Ryan Sorote/NLQ