MANILA, Philippines--The Department of Education (DepEd) is planning to relocate schools located in disaster-prone areas that suffered about P2-billion worth of damage in the aftermath of Tropical Storms ?Ondoy? and ?Pepeng.?

In a press conference Friday, Education Undersecretary Ramon Bacani said the DepEd had started identifying the public schools located in geohazard-prone areas.

?These [schools] are being identified and relocation will be planned if there is a need to relocate them to safer ground,? he said.

Bacani cited public schools in Baguio City, saying many of them were located in areas prone to landslides.

He said the teachers, parents and students in schools identified as being at risk would be consulted.

11 million books damaged
The DepEd is also considering an emergency purchase of textbooks to replace those damaged by the floods.

Ondoy and Pepeng damaged more than 11 million textbooks in six regions worth more than P739 million, the DepEd said in a report.

The Instructional Materials Council Secretariat (IMCS) maintains spare copies, but the 467,676 copies stored in the office are insufficient to replace all the textbooks lost to the floods, IMCS director Socorro Pilor said.

As for schools in flood-prone areas, Bacani said flood control projects?not relocation?was the answer.

He cited public schools in the cities of Caloocan, Malabon, Navotas and Valenzuela which used to be flooded during high tide even with no rains.

Bacani said schools were not heavily flooded during Ondoy, thanks to the flood control projects in the area.

Quick response budget
Learning from its experiences with Ondoy and Pepeng, DepEd is planning to ask for a P1-billion quick response budget for next year. This year, it was only allocated P600 million for quick response, Bacani said.

The DepEd has allocated for building repairs at least P115 million, the amount remaining of its P600-million quick response fund for this year.

Thus, it is asking private groups to join its adopt-a-school program, a project the Philippine Daily Inquirer has participated in, Bacani said.

Bacani said the replacement of textbooks started in Marikina City last week. Deliveries are ongoing in Pasig City and Caloocan City.

Deliveries to other affected areas in the metropolis will be completed by Nov. 6, he said.

Donations and modules

Bacani admitted the student to textbook ratio would likely deteriorate. But Pilor said some book publishers had donated some textbooks while learning modules were being distributed in place of textbooks in the meantime.

Schools in Metro Manila lost some 2.68 million textbooks while schools in Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon lost 2.44 million books. Some 2.36 million textbooks were damaged in the Ilocos region during Pepeng.