Classrooms lack complaints hound DepEd-Negros Or
DUMAGUETE CITY — The Department of Education in Negros Oriental has been the subject of several complaints from distraught teachers and parents due to lack of classrooms in the province, with the agency even admitting that more than 500 of these are still unfinished.
Engineer Philip Tubog, head of the provincial DepEd’s Education Facilities Section, told The FREEMAN that their main office in Manila was already informed of this concern, following the barrage of complaints made through the Office of the President’s 8888 hotline.
Representatives from the DepEd central office in Manila are expected to visit the province regularly to investigate the concern and to ensure that the classrooms will be finished as soon as possible.
According to a report signed by DepEd-Negros Oriental Schools Division Superintendent Wilfreda Bongalos, a total of 149 out of the 506 unfinished public classrooms and Technical Vocation and Livelihood (TVL) workshops in the province date back to as far as 2014. Four years had passed, and these are still under construction.
Most of the unfinished classrooms and workshops started construction in 2016, and 271 of these are either still being made or have been abandoned. Another 86 started construction only last year.
Many of the yet unfinished classrooms and workshops are in schools located in the province’s first district, which spans from Canlaon City to Manjuyod town.
Tubog said that, while the DepEd and the Department of Public Works and Highways are also partly to blame, private construction firms as their contractors are a big factor in the delay of the construction of classrooms and workshops in Negros Oriental.
Some of these contractors have told DepEd that the lack of roads to some schools in the province, especially those located in the hinterland areas, make the building of these new classrooms a logistics nightmare.
“Naay mga nagkalain-laing rason (ang mga contractors). Naay mokalit rag biya tungod kay kulang ilang pondo. Dugay kakubra. Sa contractor gyud na,” Tubog said.
Also part of the reason for the delays in the construction of classrooms is the reported lack of manpower at the DPWH, which is considered the sole agency that carries out such projects, Tubog said.
“Looy kaayo ang mga estudyante ani,” he said, adding that some schools have resorted to creating makeshift classrooms in order to accommodate the growing number of students in Negros Oriental.
Both DepEd and DPWH have conducted coordination meetings earlier this year to check on the situation of the unfinished classrooms. Officers of the DPWH have assured the public that they will in turn hold meetings with their private contractors to speed up the process, Tubog said.
The FREEMAN visited Ong Chee Tee High School in Bacong town, where a new school building is still being constructed years after the project started in 2014.
The building is almost complete and some of the classrooms are already being used; however, students attending classes there would have to deal with the noise of construction equipment and workers potentially disturbing their lessons.
“Gapabilin lang gihapon ang problema (sa kakulangon sa classrooms), ug hangtod karon wala pa gihapon makit-i og unsay maayong solusyon,” Tubog added.