VP Sara: Lack of school facilities still basic education’s main problem

The lack of school infrastructure and facilities remains to be the basic education’s primary problem up to this date, Vice President and Education Secretary Sara Duterte said Monday.

During her presentation of the Basic Education Report (BER) 2023, Duterte acknowledged the need to build and repair school facilities in order to accommodate the learning needs of millions of students in the country.

“The lack of school infrastructure and resources to support the ideal teaching process is the most pressing issue pounding the Philippine basic education,” she said.

“The Department is not blind to the reality that there is a need to build, repair, and maintain school infrastructures to accommodate the growing number of learners all over the Philippines,” she added.

There are more than 28.4 million students enrolled in 44,931 public schools and 12,162 private schools nationwide in the current academic year.

Citing latest data, Duterte said only 104,536 out of the 327,851 school buildings in the country are in good condition.

There are also 100,072 school buildings that need minor repairs, 89,252 that need major repairs, and 21,727 that are set for condemnation.

Another challenge that Duterte pointed out with regard to infrastructure was that schools are not calamity-proof, thus prone to earthquakes, typhoons, landslides, flooding, and even armed conflicts.

She said Typhoon Odette in December last year damaged a total of 17,263 classrooms in the Visayas region alone.

“We need P9.82 billion for the repair and replacement of Odette-damaged classrooms in the Visayas alone. For 2023, the Department has allocated a total of P15.6 billion for new construction,” she said.

With this budget, Duterte said DepEd could build around 6,000 classrooms in 2023.

During the first day of the resumption of the in-person classes for School Year 2022-2023, Duterte had said that classroom shortage should not be an excuse to keep the students from going back to in-person classes.

Duterte also mentioned that DepEd is seeing a decline of enrollment figures in private schools, prompting some of them to stop their operations.

She said that more than 1,600 private schools nationwide closed down from 2020 to 2022.

As a solution to all these issues, Duterte discussed that as part of its “MATATAG” education agenda, DepEd is committed to take steps to improve the delivery of basic education facilities and services.

She said the agency recently established the School Infrastructure and Facilities Strand devoted to addressing long-standing issues on educational facilities and infrastructure. This strand will be headed by DepEd Undersecretary Epimaco Densing III.

“We commit to closing the remaining gaps in school infrastructure with policies to eliminate corruption, and insulate the allocation of school building funds from politicization,” she said.

The Education chief also vowed to provide schools with electricity within the next 5 years, and establish fully-functional library hubs in DepEd’s division offices.

Duterte also said that DepEd will optimize the use of technology, both online and offline, to make sure that students have opportunities to learn even in the event of a pandemic or other emergencies.

“We will provide e-classroom packages for teaching and learning. Each package will consist of 46 laptops, two charging carts, two wireless routers, and one smart TV. This will accelerate the integration of ICT in teaching and learning and institutionalize blended learning,” she added. — RSJ, GMA Integrated News