18 Davao public schools may resume F2F classes once PRRD allows it

Photo credit to Pixabay
Photo credit to Pixabay

WHILE the resumption of the face-to-face (F2F) classes in the country remains uncertain, the Department of Education-Davao Region (DepEd-Davao) said 18 public schools in the region are on standby in case President Rodrigo Duterte will give the idea a go signal.

Duterte said on Monday evening, June 21, 2021, that he stands by his decision to allow the resumption of face-to-face classes only if the majority of the Filipinos are vaccinated against Covid-19.

The President made the decision amid the threat posed by the Delta variant of Sars-Cov-2, which has been shown to be 60 percent more contagious.

Upon hearing the President’s decision, Education Secretary Leonor Briones immediately withdrew DepEd’s request to allow limited F2F classes in at least 100 schools in the country.

DepEd-Davao Spokesperson Jenielito Atillo said in a press conference that the 18 schools are out of the total of 2,181 public schools in the region.

Atillo declined to name the schools but revealed that all of them are outside Davao City.

The 18 schools are also out of the 300 schools in the entire country deemed ready for the F2F classes. The country has a total of 60,000 public schools.

"As you can see, konti lang ang mga schools (there are only a few schools) that we have readied. But all of these are on standby mode, simply because the president has spoken already. There will be no face-to-face [classes] unless and until he changes his decision," Atillo said.

He said their list is still subject to change as they have parameters set before a school will be qualified for the gradual F2F.

These include the approval of the local government, parents, and other stakeholders.

He said the facilities and teaching personnel must also be ready for the resumption of physical classes.

He added that the department also takes into consideration the Covid-19 situation of the area, especially within the community.

Based on the feedback they received, Atillo said most parents still prefer the traditional F2F mode of learning due to some factors, including difficulty in facilitating their children in their studies.

"Daghan nagpadayag kung pwede mag-face-to-face (Many expressed that if possible, we go back to face-to-face) due to a lot of reasons, including naa'y kalisdanan sa ilaha og pag-facilitate sa pagtudlo ug kasabot mi ana kay (they struggle in facilitating in teaching, and we understand because) they are not actually teachers and they are not trained for that," Atillo said.

Teachers also wanted to resume F2F since their task load doubled since the "new normal" learning modality started in October 2020, he said.

Briones, in a previous presser, revealed that Davao Region was reconsidering joining in the pilot limited F2F classes.

She said during a virtual press conference last April 30 that Davao was supposedly included in DepEd’s plan to conduct pilot F2F classes for the whole month of January 2021 in select schools in areas declared as low-risk for coronavirus transmission.

DepEd-Davao Regional Director Allan Farnazo said while there has been "anxiety" on the part of the region to participate in the limited F2F classes, but they reconsidered participating due to the continuing downtrend of Covid-19 cases in the entire region, especially in Davao City.

Briones said DepEd will remain prepared should the situation improve and F2F classes may resume.

She earlier expressed concern over the possible impact of the prolonged school closure to the Psychosocial aspect of the students and teachers.

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