Briones: No calls for her resignation
THE Department of Education (DepEd) on Friday disputed reports that “thousands of public school teachers” in Pangasinan had called for the resignation of the agency’s chief.
DepEd Undersecretary and chief of staff Nepomuceno Malaluan belied a report, stating that thousands of public-school teachers in Pangasinan had urged President Rodrigo Duterte to fire Secretary Leonor Briones because “she is no longer capable of serving and performing her duties and responsibilities.”
He referred to the story run by TheManilaTimes on October 19 with the headline, “Sack Briones, Duterte urged.”
The story cited three public-school district supervisors from Dagupan City Schools Division Office under Superintendent Celia Ligaya Fernandez, who all refused to be named.
Malaluan said no interview with the three supervisors took place upon their validation.
“There are only 10 district superintendents in Pangasinan, and all of them attest[ed] that no interview with any of them took place nor [did they make] any statement as quoted in the report,” he added in a DepEd virtual briefing.
Malaluan said “there is no other source” mentioned by the story apart from the three anonymous interviewees.
The report also quoted the interviewees as saying the 80-yearold Briones is “too old to hold a Cabinet office.”
To which the DepEd chief replied, “I’m 80 [years old] and proud.”
Malaluan also denied allegations of the article that all teachers in the province were made to spend their own money for printing and reproducing self-learning modules ( SLMs) used in online instruction, adopted by the department.
Meanwhile, more errors in the SLMs were being spotted by the DepEd, an official said.
Education Undersecretary for Curriculum and Instruction Diosdado San Antonio said the DepEd, through its Error Watch Initiative launched last October 12, has been informed about 41 errors in the modules from October 12 to 20.
The department launched the Error Watch Initiative after an influx of reports of modular errors hounded the agency.
Of the 41 errors, 27 were developed locally or those which were made by teachers, 11 errors had unknown origins and three were spotted through the agency’s quality assurance check.
Of the 41 errors, about half or 20 were factual errors; seven, computational; four, printing; four, mistakes in spelling or punctuation; three, typographical; two, wrong format in font and illustration; and one, a mistake in syntax.
Complaints may be reported through email by sending them to errorwatch@ deped.gov.ph via SMS and Viber through +63.961.6805334; through Facebook Messenger: DepEd Error Watch (@depederrorwatch); and through Workchat DepEd Error Watch (deped.workplace.com/ groups/616392985671470/).