DepEd mulls extending class hours in typhoon-damaged schools

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Education (DepEd) is considering extending class hours in schools affected by super typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) last November to allow students to catch up with missed lessons.

The DepEd’s school calendar has 200 school days, which includes a 20-day buffer for class disruptions.

DepEd Assistant Secretary Rey Laguda, however, could not say yet how many schools in areas affected by Yolanda have already resumed classes.

The agency is also assisting the affected school divisions to retrieve their records, according to the DepEd official.

“We will ask them (school heads) to identify crucial records which can be retrieved,” Laguda told reporters, adding the most affected group are graduating students.

He said they are also looking at issuing certification to students, whose records could no longer be recovered.

Last week, the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA) donated 40 Samsung tablets to the DepEd to be used in the restoration and preservation of records, which were soaked, or totally destroyed at the height of Yolanda.

“By next week, we will be bringing these (tablets) to Leyte and Samar. This assistance from TIKA would surely help speed up the process in bringing back normalcy to the students’ school calendar and would eventually sustain our schools in the prevention of the same problem in file storage for similar disasters in the future,” Laguda said.

He said the DepEd continues to assess the damage to schools caused by Yolanda, which lashed the Visayas and Southern Luzon last Nov. 8, leaving more than 5,600 dead and P30 billion in damage.

An initial assessment of the DepEd showed 50 to 60 percent of schools were damaged in Tacloban and Ormoc in Leyte, the two areas hardest hit by the super typhoon.

Laguda said they will meet with school heads from affected regions today to discuss the extent of damage of the typhoon to public schools and set deadline for the rehabilitation and reconstruction of destroyed classrooms.