SAN JOSE De BUENAVISTA, Antique — Some schools in the Antique Division of the Department of Education (DepEd) have to implement shifting of classes or put up makeshift classrooms in order to resolve room shortage.
Dr. Gaudencio C. Riego, Chief Education Supervisor of the DepEd Antique Curriculum and Implementation Division, said in an interview that schools like the Antique National School (ANS), which has 27 sections per year level, had to implement shifting of classes just to be able to accommodate students.
“There is a morning class that starts at 6 o’ clock in the morning to 1 o’clock in the afternoon and an afternoon class from 1 o’clock in the afternoon to 8 o’clock in the evening,” he said.
He said that other schools had to temporarily make use of their libraries and gymnasium as classrooms.
Dr. Riego attributed the classroom shortage to the increase in the enrollment of students by 11.63 percent in the senior high school particularly in the Grade 11. Last year there were only 6,265 students but this school year the population increased to 7,006 students.
“There are also ongoing school building constructions,” he said.
Antique has 5,035 public schools; 54 are secondary schools.
The construction of school buildings in secondary schools is ongoing so they could cater to more enrollees.
The DepEd teams that started their weeklong monitoring of the opening of classes Monday also reported that 90 percent of the students in elementary and high school had attended the last Monday flag ceremony.
Dr. Riego said that they are also thankful for the police assistance extended to ensure that the students could safely attend their classes.(Perla Lena/PNA)
