Same old problems hound school opening

Perennial problems hound public and private students from both in the elementary and secondary levels return to their respective schools today, marking the start of the 2010-2011 school year.

Education Secretary Mona Valisno said they expect 24.43 million students to return to school, to which 20.17 million or 86 percent of the total number will be attending public schools, while 3.26 million will go to private schools.

Of the number, 3.15 million are in Grade 1 and 1.73 million in first year high school.

All in all, 13.44 million students will attend public elementary schools and 5.65 million in public secondary schools, while 1.17 million and 1.45 million will be attending private elementary and secondary schools, respectively.

Another 0.88 million are enrolled in public pre-schools and 0.45 million in private pre-schools.

The Department of Education (DepEd) said this year’s enrolment figures showed an increase of close to one million from the 2009 level of 22.44 million (19.46 million in the public schools and 2.98 million in private schools).

In 2008, the number of students stood at 21.61 million, or an increase of nearly one million from the 2007 figures of 20.91 million.

Enrolment has consistently risen over the years with Education officials attributing this to an increase in the population of the country

as well as campaign to get as many school-age children and out-of-school-youth to attend classes.

There are 43,204 public elementary and secondary schools and 15,841 pre-schools and 9, 985 private schools nationwide.

Valisno claimed a large number of students from private schools also transferred to public schools this academic year.

“We cannot refuse anyone that will come to our public school system,” Valisno said.

In 2009, there were 22.44 million enrolled students both from pre-school to high school both in public and private schools nationwide.

But Valisno said compared to this year the problems facing the students in public schools will be lesser as DepEd was able to “front-load” its resources for the construction of school buildings, hiring of additional teachers, procurement of textbooks and other supplies.

The DepEd is hiring 10,000 new teachers to add to the existing 501,158.

This, the DepEd chief added ensures a 1:36 teacher-to-student ratio this school year.

As to the perennial problem of lack of classrooms, she said DepEd is targeting some 10,000 new classrooms this year.

“There is ongoing construction of 3, 616 classrooms nationwide and we are requesting an additional 54, 362 for the next school year,” Valisno said, adding the average classroom-to-student ratio stood at 1:45.

The DepEd has a current inventory of 429,390 classrooms nationwide.

As to textbooks, Valisno said there is an ongoing delivery of 5.73 million new textbooks to add to the existing 86.2 million.

In school furniture, the department said there is an ongoing procurement of 2.19 million chairs to add to current 15.61 million.

“We have a textbook-to-pupil ratio of one is to one in the five core subjects such as Mathematics, English and Science,” the official said.

Likewise, Valisno said she has instructed all DepEd officials in Metro Manila and school district superintendents to work with other education stakeholders and the DepEd Central Office to solve all problems in their respective schools.

Outside of Metro Manila, Valisno said DepEd regional and division offices are instructed to monitor all development within their respective areas and assist school officials should problem arise.

“We are prepared for today’s school opening and we are confident that the school opening this year will run smoothly and orderly,” she added.

Meanwhile, some 8,000 policemen will be deployed by the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) during the opening of classes today for most of the public and private schools within Metro Manila, a ranking police official said Monday. –Jason Faustino, PNA