The Department of Education (DepEd) through Secretary Juan Edgardo ‘Sonny’ Angara said on Thursday the fund is ready for the repair of educational facilities and classrooms damaged by severe tropical storm ‘Kristine.’
“We have a quick response fund (to facilitate) repair, then for smaller repairs, the schools have internal funds,” Angara said.
Latest data from DepEd showed there are 235 totally damaged classrooms and 415 partially damaged in need of major repair. Estimated cost of initial infrastructure damage reached a total of P765-million.
Moreover, 36, 894 schools were affected by the tropical storm ‘Kristine’ with 18.9 million students and more than 765,000 teaching and non-teaching personnels. Angara said the department is concerned how the multiple storms would affect the quality of education for students.
“Actually, we are worried. So, what we did is we collated information on the number of missed classes, and how many (schools) were forced to cancel classes,” according to the DepEd chief.
“That is our concern right now because it appears that the storms are getting more frequent and it is important to ensure these won’t result in learning loss,” Angara added.
He noted that holding Saturday classes to compensate for the missed school days will be left to school principals.
The Education secretary also emphasized that despite a DepEd order stating that public schools may only serve as evacuation centers for only 15 days, the priority right now is the safety of affected Filipinos.
“Even if we have that policy, once a storm hits, how can you tell them not to use (the schools) as evacuation centers? You can’t, okay? Look at what’s happening now in Bicol, right? How can you tell them that? They lost their homes, their cars, they have nowhere else to go,” Angara said.
