DepEd: 42 public schools have yet to start classes

MANILA, Philippines — Forty-two schools remained unable to open classes for school year (SY) 2024-2025 yesterday due to flooding from heavy rains, the Department of Education (DepEd) reported.

Hundreds of schools nationwide were forced to postpone the opening of classes on July 29 due to damage caused by typhoons and the monsoon-induced heavy rains and floods. All schools were expected to reopen yesterday.

The 42 schools, all in Malabon City, are still grappling with flooding damage caused by Typhoon Carina and Sunday night’s heavy rains.

Dennis Legaspi, media relations chief of Education Secretary Sonny Angara, said 47,818 schools had already opened as of yesterday.

Meanwhile, the DepEd said 23,845,025 students have enrolled for SY 2024-2025 in public and private elementary, junior high school, senior high school and Alternative Learning System (ALS).

The breakdown showed that 20,859,109 students are enrolled in public schools, while 2,666,903 students are enrolled in private schools.

Meanwhile, 38,277 students are enrolled in state and local universities and colleges offering basic education, while 280,736 are enrolled under the ALS.

Per education level, elementary schools have the most number of enrollees with 13,234,374 students, followed by junior high schools with 7,011,942 and senior high schools with 3,317,973.

Most of the enrollees come from Calabarzon with 3,464,861, followed by Central Luzon and the National Capital Region, both with over 2.4 million enrollees.

Only a week since classes reopened for this school year, teachers are on the verge of tapping out due to prolonged teaching hours, the Teachers’ Dignity Coalition (TDC) reported yesterday, as it called on the DepEd to shorten the six-hour teaching policy in public schools.

The TDC said the DepEd needs to suspend the implementation of class programs under the MATATAG curriculum and the six-hour teaching policy and start consultations with teachers bearing the brunt of the “burdensome” policies.

“Many teachers are saying they are tired after only a week. Others wanted to give up on the first day,” TDC chairman Benjo Basas said.

The TDC disclosed that they have received numerous reports of teachers spending six hours or more delivering lessons, with some handling too many grade/year levels and some teaching subjects that were not their majors.

Basas said teachers have been forced to resort to such measures just to complete the six-hour teaching policy under DepEd Order 5, which serves as a working hour policy under the MATATAG curriculum.

“The purpose of MATATAG is to decongest our curriculum and reduce the subjects to be taught to children. Instead, not only did the class time get longer, but there were additional sessions, like the National Mathematics Program (NMP) and the National Reading Program (NRP), which made it more difficult for the students and even the teachers,” he added.

Angara earlier said the DepEd would oversee the strict implementation of the six-hour maximum teaching period per day as mandated under Republic Act 4670 or the Magna Carta for Public School Teachers, amid complaints of teaching overload under the MATATAG curriculum.

He acknowledged the existing problems for teachers and promised to correct them.

“We want to clarify the requirement to render six-hour actual classroom teaching, which deviates from the provision of the Magna Carta. In the law, there is no requirement of six hours, it can be six hours, but it can also be less,” Basas said.

He stressed that teachers used to be allowed to teach for less than six hours, have breaks in between classes and go home after six hours in school under RA 4670 provisions.

“It will never be just to make teachers suffer using policies that were intended to give us reprieve. The solution to this problem is to hire more teachers so that many will share the work. It’s not just actual teaching that we do every day,” he added.

In another development, the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) scored President Marcos’ Executive Order (EO) 64 that raises the salaries of civilian government personnel scheduled in four tranches, calling it “long-due, grossly insufficient and dishearteningly stingy.”

“Once again the teachers and government staff have become victims of this tightfisted government. This EO 64 is no different from the measly increase that government workers have received in past Salary Standardization Laws. More than P40 million was spent to supposedly study the ‘competitive and equitable’ salaries of public servants, but the salary increase we can expect in four years is nothing,” ACT-National Capital Region Union president Ruby Bernardo said.

Citing “prevailing economic circumstances” and the need to maintain a “competent, agile and healthy” public workforce, Marcos issued EO 64, which also authorized the grant of additional allowance to those deemed qualified.

Signed for the President on Aug. 2 by Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin, EO 64 details the salary increases for all civilian government personnel in the executive, legislative and judicial branches as well as in constitutional commissions and other constitutional offices.

The wage increase, according to EO 64, also covers personnel of government-owned or -controlled corporations not covered by RA 10149 or the GOCC Governance Act of 2011 and EO 150 on compensation classification issued in 2021.

The updated salary schedule will be implemented in national government agencies in four tranches. The first tranche took effect retroactively last Jan. 1, the second on Jan. 1, 2025, the third and fourth on the same date in 2026 and 2027, the Presidential Communications Office said in a statement yesterday.

Based on the ACT’s computation, the annual raise over four years amounts to a “meager” P50-increase in the daily wage of 90 percent of teachers, with expected increased deductions for mandatory contributions and taxes, further eroding its value.

“More so, Salary Grade (SG) 1 employees are set to only receive a pitiful P20-increase over the same period, while the President’s minimum monthly salary, currently at P419,000, will soar to nearly P460,000 by the fourth tranche,” the group said.

It also emphasized that these raises are “nothing more than crumbs, failing miserably to address the ever-widening gap between the cost of living and the meager wages that majority of the civilian workforce are forced to survive on and exacerbating salary distortion in government service.”