With face masks on, Grade 3 pupils at Comembo Elementary School in Makati City ease back into their usual classroom activities during Thursday’s “simulation” of in-person classes. (RICHARD A. REYES / INQUIRER)
MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Education (DepEd) has not reported a single confirmed COVID-19 case among those participating of the pilot in-person classes which kicked off last month.
“Fortunately, for the four weeks that we have implemented the pilot [classes], we have zero confirmed cases. We have zero cases of COVID among our learners and among those teaching and non-teaching personnel who are participating,” DepEd Assistant Secretary Malcolm Garma said during Friday’s hearing of the Senate basic education committee.
Garma, however, noted that the attendance of students for the four weeks of the pilot implementation of face-to-face classes did notreach 100 percent.
According to Garma, the average weekly attendance on the first week of the pilot classes was at 82 percent, 83 percent on the second week, 82 percent on third week, and 84.2 percent on the fourth week.
“There are learners that manifest yung flu-like symptoms and this include cough, fever, cold,” he said.
“In fact in week one, 100 learners have manifested these symptoms, in week two, 53, in week three, 54, and in week four, 97,” Garma noted.
“Itong mga batang itong manifested the symptom ay hindi na po pumasok sa school [These kids that manifested symptoms no longer went to class]. This data is reported as non-attendance to the limited face-to-face,” he said.
“Ibig sabihin po nito, sa bahay pa lang po, yung mga magulang ay nagdedecide na na wag papasukin yung kanilang anak because of these symptoms,” he added.
(This means, they stayed home, the parents decided not to allow them to go to school because of these symptoms.)
Garma added that these students were immediately assessed by medical personnel as part of the guidelines laid down by the DepEd.
“Immediately these children, these learners manifesting these flu-like symptoms are immediately referred to concerned medical units through the LGU (local government unit) or DOH (Department of Health) para po ma-assess sila,” he said.
As of December 15, Garma noted that there are a total of 287 schools participating in the limited implementation of face-to-face classes – 265 public schools and 22 private achools.