DepEd identifies 59 schools for pilot in-person classes starting Nov. 15
The Department of Education released Oct. 6 the list of 59 schools out of 638 nominated for the pilot implementation of face-to-face classes starting Nov. 15.
According to DepEd, the chosen schools were vetted by the Department of Health’s Epidemiology Bureau as minimal or low risk based on the Alert Levels of their provinces or cities.
On Sept. 27, DepEd said teachers participating in the pilot testing must be fully vaccinated, walking back its earlier announcement that it wasn’t mandatory.
“We are in the middle of the most aggressive campaign for the vaccination of our teachers and the rest of our citizens. It is now fairly safe for us to start the pilot study,” DepEd Planning Service Director Roger Masapol said.
Under the DepEd guidelines, a class size is a maximum of 12 learners for kinder, 16 for Grades 1 to 3, 20 for senior high school, 12 for SHS in a workshop/science and laboratory.
Here are the 59 schools schools in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
At Oct. 6’s hearing of the Senate committee on basic education on the resumption of face-to-face classes, Education Undersecretary Nepomuceno Malaluan said that DepEd will continue to assess nominated schools until the initial quota for the pilot run is reached.
“There were preparations to see that all systems go…We start on Nov. 15, the face-to-face classes and we set it in pilot schools at the start of the second quarter academic calendar,” Malaluan said during the hearing presided over by Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian.
Malaluan added, “It will end by December and will reopen in January. While classes continue, we will not stop the process in the pilot schools, data will be gathered to be able to submit a report to the President on the pilot run. We are targeting an expansion by March 7.”
He noted that they will also be preparing for assessments of possible expansions subject to the approval of the President. Quoting a UNICEF report, Gatchalian said the Philippines is one of the two countries which have yet to conduct face-to-face classes since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world. (With a report from Cecile Suerte/Philippine Star)
Banner photo: A teacher prepares her teaching module in a classroom. File photo by Andy Zapata/Philippine Star
