A 74-year-old school located in a 10,000-square meter donated land in Nueva Ecija’s largest and premier city, Cabanatuan, now has an additional school building courtesy of SM Prime Holdings through SM Foundation. This is the 72nd school building built so far by the SM Group of Companies with some partners through the SM Foundation.
The new two-story four-classroom building augments the 10 buildings in the campus of Bakod Bayan Elementary School. The school has a population of 1,200 with 71 students to a classroom. With the new classrooms, decongestion of classrooms is expected even if student population is anticipated to increase by 200 this coming school year 2016-2017. The new classrooms will be used by Grades V and VI students. Jaymart Alimarcan, a Grade VI student, thanked SM Foundation in behalf of the students. He shared the students’ excitement to use the new classrooms complete with new chairs, blackboards, ceiling fans, toilets, and even teachers’ tables and chairs. “Maiinspire po kami mag-aral [We will be inspired to study],” he added.
Bakod Bayan Elementary School started as the Bayan Bakod Barrio School teaching only Grades I and II until 1967 when it became a full-fledged elementary school servicing schoolchildren from Grades I to VI. During the early years of its existence, when it was not yet offering the complete elementary curriculum, students had to transfer to a nearby barangay, Barangay San Isidro to pursue their last two years of elementary schooling. The need for a school in the barangay did not go unnoticed. A kind benefactor, Rufino Halili, generously donated the lot where the school now stands.
The school has a complement of 23 teachers in the elementary level with two teachers handling kindergarten classes. School Principal Trinidad G. Beltran, grateful to SM Foundation for the new school building, says “I prayed for God’s blessings to bring this school into the modern era with caring and dedicated teachers in a safe, comfortable environment for the young generation of our community.” Moreover, one of the challenges that greeted her upon assuming the post of school principal was the lack of appropriate classrooms, for a while there were existing classrooms, these were dilapidated.