Got issues? Share them online, Paz urges kids

CEBU, Philippines – Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Paz Radaza has advised the children to use the social media to report problems and issues that need government attention.

"Social media has become an important communication tool in the digital age," she said during her State of the Children Report in Hoops Dome, attended by thousands of children from schools and from the government-owned home care center.

"You know very well that my administration is using Facebook and Twitter to bring government closer to the people," she added.

Radaza said social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter have helped the city identify problems and solve them.

According to her, concerns mostly raised on Facebook drove the city to fix up 70 percent of the its 96-kilometer roads and to build six kilometers of drainage lines.

"We're upgrading our city hospital because I heard your concerns on Facebook," she said.

The mayor reported that the city government spent P124 million to build 115 classrooms since the middle of last year.

She also urged schools to apply technology in their teaching methods and to include tourism courses in technical-vocation education in senior high school.

"Since our city is a tourism haven, we need to prepare our youth so they can work in the tourism industry," she said.

Radaza said the technical and vocational programs under the K to 12 curriculum should prepare the city's students for jobs in the field of tourism.

To help children learn better, the city government will install STARBOOKS in different schools.

STARBOOKS or Science and Technology Academic and Research-Based Openly Operated Kiosk System is a facility that contains thousands of digitized science and technology resources in different formats.

"This will encourage great and curious minds to develop new ideas, inventions and innovations," the mayor said.

STARBOOKS will be installed in the public high schools in the islands of Caubian and Pangan-an, as well as the high schools in Barangays Tingo and Sta. Rosa in Olango Island.

The said resource facility will be also put up in Olango Island's mini-city hall, Radaza said.

She said the city will be also installing similar facility at the Lapu-Lapu City College-Basak Campus and Gun-ob Campus, Marigondon National High School and the City Library.

Apart from focusing on education programs, Radaza said her administration has also supported sports by declaring Hoops Dome as a center for indoor games.

Radaza also said the city continues to implement immunization and hunger mitigation programs for children. The city's Stimulation and Therapeutic Activity Center has also served 557 children with disabilities, she added. (FREEMAN)