‘Kindergarten on wheels’ parks at Quezon City school

Five-year-olds at a Quezon City public school have a new classroom—and it’s on wheels.

The Bagong Henerasyon party-list group, the Quezon City government and the Department of Education (DepEd) on Tuesday launched the city’s first Kindergarten on Wheels, touted to be an “innovative, creative solution” to school overcrowding in urban areas.

The P800,000 learning truck was inaugurated at the President Corazon Aquino Elementary School near the Congress complex in Batasan Hills in commemoration of the late president’s 79th birthday today.

“This is in tribute to former President Cory Aquino on her 79th birthday, knowing her love for the youth. This is very important because at the age of five children absorb everything. It can change their future,” said Bagong Henerasyon Rep. Bernadette Herrera-Dy.

Dy filed the bill renaming Batasan Hills Elementary School after Aquino in 2010.

The mobile classroom was spun off Dy’s mobile computer classroom program which has a fleet of 20 vehicles bringing information technology education to schools across the country.

Equipped with audio-visual equipment, the air-conditioned, 24-seat mobile classroom can hold almost 100 students in four shifts, Dy said. Currently, more than 600 students take turns using four kindergarten classrooms at Aquino Elementary, said the lawmaker.

Corazon Rubio, Quezon City education superintendent, said most city public schools hold two shifts of classes as the student population has annually increased. Where to build has also become a problem for Quezon City schools as the city has run out of land to build on.

“We chose a Quezon City elementary school because here, 632 kindergarten pupils use only four classrooms. Kindergarten on Wheels can declog the classrooms by 100 students,” Dy said.

Education Secretary Armin Luistro said the mobile kindergarten classroom could be moved elsewhere once the ongoing construction of additional classrooms at Aquino Elementary was finished.