Provincial gov’t continues building classrooms to address nat’l shortage

By John Noel E. Herrera

The Iloilo Provincial Government continues to implement projects related to the construction of more classrooms at the municipal level to address the nationwide problem of shortage of learning facilities.

Iloilo Governor Arthur Defensor Jr. said in a press conference on Thursday, March 23, 2023 that they are monitoring the education set up of students in schools, particularly the classrooms, as it is vital for their learning process.

“Right now, aggressive kita sa classrooms. We are monitoring right now and we downloaded a lot of budget,” Defensor said.

“Ang aton design, we have typhoon resilient classrooms ang gina ubra naton subong. We are completely addressing the problem nga ginabuligan naton ang national sa backlog,” he added.

The governor stressed that his campaign to address the classroom shortage in the province and give students a resilient and efficient facility to study is anchored on the provincial government’s “Bulig Eskwela Sang Probinsya” (BES Probins) Program.

“One component (of the BES Probins program) is our full support to the infrastructure program of the national government and right now, we have placed a lot of funds for 2022 and 2023 for the construction of classrooms. Starting this year, we will also construct teen centers,” Defensor said.

The governor signed Executive Order 420 (BES Probins Program) last September 2022 for the implementation of the program for an effective, relevant, and transformative educational system in Iloilo province.

In November 2022, 34 elementary and secondary schools in Iloilo province received a total of P100.93 million in funds sourced from the provincial government’s Special Education Fund (SEF) which will be used for the construction of school buildings and rehabilitation and repair of learning facilities.

Last month, the Provincial School Board, headed by Defensor, also released a total of P11,025,000 worth of school projects to 35 public elementary and secondary schools in the province.

The provincial government earlier noted that they allotted over P200 million to the SEF this year with priority programs and projects of building extra classrooms for the full implementation of face-to-face classes; enhancing farm schools; water systems; restrooms and laundry facilities; purchasing educational materials and dental supplies, among others.

Meanwhile, the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) called on the government to focus on building more classrooms and address the nationwide shortage issue as the country currently faces over 160,000 classrooms backlog.

ACT chairperson Vladimer Quetua stressed that the administration should allocate more funding to the education sector, citing that the BBM infrastructure program has a P1.2 trillion budget in 2023, while classroom construction only has P15.6 billion in funds.

The Department of Education (DepEd), in return, said that they are looking at other funding sources outside the national budget to address the shortage, just like getting money from private organizations and foreign governments.

DepEd Undersecretary Epimaco Densing III added that the classroom backlog has already affected at least four to five million students nationwide.

DepEd-Western Visayas, on the other hand, explained that they are still reviewing the latest data on classroom backlog in the region.

But a report last August 2022, based on the data from the Basic Education Learning Continuity and Recovery Plan of different schools’ division offices in the region, indicated that DepEd-6 needed 16,494 new classrooms.

Negros Occidental needed 9,333 classrooms, while Capiz needed 5,073; followed by Antique (737); Aklan (508); Bacolod City (462), and Iloilo province (381).

Aside from additional classrooms, Escullar previously explained that 14,464 learning spaces needed major repairs, while 13,941 needed minor repairs and 811 for replacement or reconstruction.

Most of the destroyed classrooms were because of the typhoons that previously hit the region, according to Escullar.

Typhoon Odette in 2021 destroyed 206,729 learning materials and 166 public schools in Western Visayas, which needed P1.1 billion for their rehabilitation, while Tropical Depression Agathon in 2022 damaged around P600,000 worth of learning materials with 185 classrooms destroyed.