DepEd expects to miss classroom construction target

MANILA, Philippines—The Department of Education may likely miss its 2012 target to address long unresolved backlogs in public school classrooms as the education chief said construction of up to 50,000 rooms could take until June 2013.

Education Secretary Armin Luistro, however, said the classroom construction program will go on full swing in the next year-and-a-half through DepEd’s annual funding, partnerships with non-governmental organizations and local government units, and  the public-private partnership program.

Luistro said some 30,000 classrooms could be built within 2012, the deadline President Benigno  Aquino had given to resolve the classroom backlog when he assumed power in 2010.

This mass construction program would include 10,000 through the DepEd budget, 10,000 through co-funding schemes with LGUs, and another 10,000 through PPP, Luistro said.

The remaining 20,000 could be finished from January to June in 2013.

“I may not be able to do the 50,000 by December 2012. But the remaining 20,000 can be programmed between January and  May 2013. So it’s still done before the 2013 school year, all of the shortages,” Luistro told the Inquirer.

Crowding in classrooms has been a perennial problem for DepEd, especially in densely populated urban areas. The shortage in classrooms forces schools to hold classes in up to three shifts or hold classes in makeshift rooms.

The annual increase in enrollment of up to 2.2 percent also compounds the problem as new students enter the learning stream while the classroom count remains short.

“Now, every year, of course it’s (number of classrooms) a moving target. But those new increases should be easily covered within the yearly budget,” Luistro said.

Earlier this year, DepEd estimated the classroom shortage at 66,000. Luistro said, however, that some 16,000 were already finished or were under construction in 2011.

“I think this is really a banner year for our engineers. The 2011 budget (for classrooms) was used for 2011, and most of the one-story buildings are already finished by December 31,” Luistro said.