Senator Ralph Recto. INQUIRER file photo
MANILA Philippines – A “big shopping cart of school supplies” was how Senate Pro Tempore Ralph Recto described on Tuesday the proposed P336.9 billion budget of the Department of Education for 2014.
Recto said the education budget next year provided for the hiring of 33,194 teachers and 1,500 principals next year in a move that will cost P9.5 billion in initial year salary.
“With this number, it can be said that DepEd will be holding a year-round job fair in 2014,” he said in a statement.
To end the perennial problem of classroom lack, Recto said, the government would build 43,183 new classrooms, repair 9,503 existing ones, and buy 1.6 million seats at a cost of P44.6 billion.
“In terms of rooms to be built, this is by far the biggest in history,” said the senator..
The 42.6 million textbooks that will be procured next year, he said, will also break the record, not to mention the 38,351 sets of science and math laboratory equipment that will be acquired.
Recto said the government was also planning to build 10 library hubs, which he described as “book centrals” to cater to multiple school districts.
The total tab for the new books, science equipment and library hubs amounted to P8.3 billion..
Recto said next year’s proposed budget for education, which is 15 percent higher than this year, was just one component of the larger “education, culture and manpower” sector which has been allotted P389.5 billion in 2014.
Included in this sector, he said, were the allocations for Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) and state universities and colleges which have been earmarked P3.7 and P39.3 billion for next year, respectively.
Recto said education spending of the government was a “combination of catching up with existing backlogs and frontloading for future needs.”