2 PCG officers sent to teach on remote Pag-asa Island

MOLDING MINDS School-aged chidren approach a coast guardsman during a program in Pag-asa Island. —Photo courtesy of Philippine Coast Guard

MANILA, Philippines — Two Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) officers have been deployed to one of the country’s most far-flung islands not just to protect the seas but to mold young minds, as the country resumes its in-person classes on Monday.

Ensigns Jev Latic, 27, and Arnel Gomora, 24, who were both assigned with Coast Guard Station Kalayaan, will help Teacher Realyn Limbo in handling 30 students from Grades 1 to 6 on Pag-asa Island in the West Philippine Sea, said Commo. Rommel Supangan, commander of Coast Guard District Palawan.

Latic and Gomora are licensed elementary teachers who completed bachelor’s degrees in elementary education. Latic is the station commander, while Gomora is the deputy station commander of Coast Guard Station Kalayaan based in Pag-asa.

“We saw the need for more teachers on the island … That’s why we coordinated with Kalayaan Mayor Roberto del Mundo so we can extend help to the school,” Supangan said.

The PCG has been sending its teachers to the island since 2014 as part of an agreement with the multi-island town of Kalayaan, a sixth-class municipality.

The island opened a school in 2012 as a form of the country’s assertion of its rights in the West Philippine Sea. From being an elementary school, it would now cater to Grades 1 to 10 starting this year.

Pag-asa, one of the nine Philippine-occupied outposts in the Kalayaan Islands, is 400 kilometers from mainland Palawan province. It has about a hundred civilian residents.

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