Tuesday, June 10, 2008 DepEd tells supervisors to monitor class opening By Rene H. Martel Sun.Star Staff Reporter
DEPARTMENT of Education (DepEd) supervisors have been told to show up in their assigned schools today to monitor the opening of classes.
That, as the Cebu City schools division braces for complaints from parents of students transferred from four barangays to the Don Carlos E. Gothong Memorial Elementary School.
Dr. Lorna Rances, Cebu city schools superintendent, appealed to parents to understand the move because it was done for the comfort of their children.
Instead of going to their schools in Barangays Pasil, Sawang Calero, San Nicolas Proper, and Punta Princesa, several
pupils will be transferred to Gothong, where newly-repaired classrooms are waiting for them.
The schools in those barangays are employing double shifts, which means students are divided into morning and afternoon sessions.
“We need the understanding of parents that this is for their (students) own good. This not going to be easy for us,” Rances said.
She said at least 200 were listed as “excess” and transferred to Gothong, but she expects more to be transferred because of late enrollees.
With the availability of classrooms in Gothong, classes in the four barangays will revert to whole-day sessions.
And if there are not enough desks, she instructed the school to use monobloc chairs, which are often used only during
school programs.
Except for Punta Princesa, Gothong is just a walking distance from San Nicolas Proper, Sawang Calero, and Pasil, she said.
She added that they are ready and will know today what problems they have to contend with.
As of yesterday afternoon, Rances was still communicating with her supervisors and telling them to report to their assigned schools.
Monitor
She wanted them to monitor the enrolment and see if there is a lack of desks, chairs, teachers, and classrooms.
The task was made easier, she said, because of text messaging.
Some teachers and students were also still cleaning their classrooms yesterday.
City education consultant Joy Augustus Young said school personnel have repaired classrooms, which the school board does throughout the year, because the division has its own carpenters, engineers, warehouse, and equipment.
“I think it is only Cebu City that has an engineering (section of the school board). We have 200 pandays (carpenters) and laborers, sets of engineers, trucks, bodega, so we are repairing all year round,” he said.
School building constructions, he said, are also being done continuously that there are structures that will be finished in two to three months. Some projects still need programs of work an estimates.
Young also said teachers and parents already cleaned the schools during the Brigada Eskwela program last month, when enrolment started.
He said Cebu City needs at least 400 school teachers but has to make do with what it has because the DepEd will never
provide 400 plantillas in one setting.
“So each year, the number of teachers is never enough. The problem is never solved. But we have done our homework. On repairs, whole year atong trabaho,” he said.
He likewise said there will always be a lack of textbooks, but the city sometimes makes up for it.
In Lapu-Lapu City, City Schools Superintendent Carmelita Dulangon warned teachers against demanding fees from parents and receiving cash donations. She said everyone is bound to follow the order of DepEd Secretary Jesli Lapus.
Dulangon and other school officials worked yesterday’s despite its being a non-working holiday by holding a short program with officials and members of the Parents Teachers Community Association (PTCA) at the City’s Hoopsdoom.
Officials explained to the PTCA the DeptEd’s policy of back to school zero fee policy and the need to pool their resources and efforts to deal with the problem on lack of classrooms, teacher and textbooks.
She said Timex Philippines will soon start constructing two classroom-buildings at Pajo Elementary School, while Babag Elementary School will be the recipient of two classroom-buildings financed by the Chinese Chamber of Commerce. (RHM/With AIV)
