1,300 new teachers for ARMM

COTABATO CITY—The Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) has hired more than 1,300 new teachers, as education officials expect an increase in enrollment for the coming school year.

Jamar Kulayan, ARMM education secretary, said the new teachers, hired for permanent positions, would be deployed to the provinces of Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Tawi-Tawi and Sulu. Maguindanao got the majority of the 1,358 teachers.

Eighty-nine percent of them are women, Kulayan said. “Women are still considered the more patient and effective educator, as most children revere mothers as their first teachers,” he said.

Mubarak Pandi, ARMM education information chief, said more teachers were still needed, as the number of pupils was expected to rise.

Pandi said 2,645 teaching slots were still available. “We are optimistic that these vacancies will soon be filled up,” he said.

In Zamboanga City, education officials are at a loss over where to hold classes, as classrooms have been either turned into evacuation camps for people displaced by the terror attack on the city by followers of Nur Misuari in September last year, or destroyed during the government siege that followed it.

This prompted officials to assign students to schools other than where they are enrolled. For example, Zamboanga East Central School will host some 2,000 pupils from Santa Barbara Elementary School. Charlie Senase and Liza Jocson, Inquirer Mindanao