Coca-Cola and AGAPP partner for schoolhouse project

MANILA, Philippines - Since 1997, Coca-Cola Foundation Philippines has pitched in to help the Department of Education (DepEd) improve access to complete elementary education in impoverished areas in the country through its Little Red Schoolhouse (LRS) project.

The Foundation has built three-classroom schoolhouses in 82 public multi-grade elementary schools nationwide and is committed to complete the 100th schoolhouse when Coca-Cola celebrates its 100th year in the Philippines in 2012.

Multi-grade is a strategy used by the DepEd in elementary schools where school populations are relatively small and teachers are scarce. A multi-grade school has one teacher handling pupils of two or three grade levels simultaneously in a single classroom. These schools are usually housed in dilapidated or temporary structures. The lack of classrooms also limits the grade level offerings in the school to fourth grade, thus requiring the children to move to another school, usually located farther from their homes, to complete their elementary education.

With the introduction of kindergarten into the public school curriculum, public schools are now facing another classroom shortage. In response to this need, the Foundation has added kindergarten classrooms to the LRS portfolio, through a partnership with Aklat, Gabay, Aruga Tungo sa Pag-Unlad (AGAPP) Foundation, a non-stock, non-profit organization that aims to generate social change by gathering volunteers for a child- and school-focused project specifically designed for underprivileged children in disadvantaged public schools.

The LRS–Silid Pangarap project will build 2-classroom kindergarten schoolhouses in 10 selected public elementary schools in the next two years. The schoolhouses will also serve as libraries to the schools’ primary grade students, with another donor providing story books.

The project also provides training to teachers and school heads on an integrated early childhood curriculum and the effective handling of kindergarten pupils. It likewise promotes home-school-community partnerships, family literacy and parent education.

Three LRS–Silid Pangarap schoolhouses were turned over recently to BV Closa Elementary School in Abuyog, Leyte; Habitat Elementary School in General Santos City; and Tip-Tip Elementary School in Tagbilaran City.

Little Red Schoolhouse-Silid Pangarap is part of Coca-Cola Philippines’s commitment to Bayanihang Pampaaralan (BP), a private sector-led initiative to help the DepEd close the 66,000 classroom gap. BP aims to build 10,000 classrooms within the next two years.