BATANGAS CITY – Some 40 inmates of the San Jose Sico Jail here completed on Friday their Junior High School through the Alternative Learning System educational program of the Department of Education, in partnership with the city government and Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP).
ALS Education Program Supervisor Nestor Alon said that of the 40 ALS graduates (29 males and 11 females), only 18 made it to receive their diplomas at Friday’s Moving Up Ceremonies for the K to 12 program 22 others were already released from prison and have led normal lives as they found renewed hope and seeking employment and livelihood.
Alon encouraged other inmates, who have stopped schooling due to their detention for some crimes that they could still complete their education through the ALS and achieve their dreams.
A 24 year-old inmate ALS completer, May Dote from this city’s Barangay San Isidro narrated that she was jailed for two years because of an illegal drug case.
“Malaking tulong po sa akin ang pagpasok sa ALS. Hindi na po ako nakapag patuloy ng pag-aaral ng high school dahil sa aking pagkakulong kung kayat nung nagkaroon po ng programa ang BJMP para sa mga di nakapag aral ay agad po ako nag enrol at eto nga po natapos ko ang junior high school,” Dote said.
(The ALS has helped me a lot. I dropped out of high school when I was hooked into drugs, but with the BJMP program for the school drop-outs and inmates, I immediately enrolled and here I am having completed my junior high school.)
Another inmate, who was awarded the “Best ALS Learner” in the batch, Mario Castillo Jr. admitted “malaking pagbabago ang dulot nito sa aking buhay. Nasa loob o nasa labas man, walang makakahadlang sa pagkamit ng ating tagumpay (Great change has come into my life with this (ALS). Whether I am in or out (of jail), there’s no stopping in my aspiration to succeed).”
Castillo considered his education “as the real weapon in the real struggle to improve myself and an instrument to change my life.”
Warden Jail Supt. Lorenzo Reyes said that the ALS was implemented and conducted inside the jail facilities through the cooperation of the city government, DepEd-Batangas City Schools Division and BJMP.
Reyes said that this is the first Moving Up Ceremony for the Junior High School in the detention facilities which adopted the theme “Mag-aaral K-12 Handa sa Hamon ng Buhay” that inspired inmates who are among the school drop-outs as a result of their breaches with the law and under imprisonment. (Maroe T. Genosa/PNA)
