DepEd to accept late enrollees in public schools

Late enrollees may still be accepted in public schools across the country even after the start of classes on Aug. 24, the Department of Education (DepEd) said yesterday.

Education Undersecretary Jesus Mateo said there is no need to extend enrollment, citing the basic education enrollment policy that allows schools to accept late enrollees provided that the student will be able to meet 80 percent of the prescribed number of school days.

This means that late enrollees may be accepted until the last week of September.

“The importance of the June enrollment is to get additional information through the Learner Enrollment Survey Form,” Mateo said, referring to survey on the capability of households to implement distance learning.

Hours before the end of the extended enrollment period yesterday, the DepEd has yet to reach its projected enrollment of 21.97 million.

As of 8 a.m., more than 20.2 million have signified their intent to enroll in public and private schools next school year.

This represents 72.7 percent of the more than 27 million students in basic education last year.

Mateo had earlier said the DepEd projected a 20-percent drop in enrollment due to the economic impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

More than 19.1 million have enrolled in public schools, which is 84.8 percent of enrolled students last year.

Only a little over a million have so far enrolled in private schools, a meager 24.3 percent of the more than four million enrollees last year.

Meanwhile, a total of 323,524 students have so far transferred to public schools from private schools and state/local colleges and universities that offer basic education programs.

More than 202,000 enrolled in elementary and around 121,000 in junior and senior high school.

During the pre-State of the Nation Address forum yesterday, Education Secretary Leonor Briones reiterated that students would not be required to procure gadgets for the coming school year.

In addition to online-based education, Briones said the agency is preparing various modes of distance learning, such as the use of radio, television and printed learning materials.

ABS-CBN frequencies

In another development, Deputy Speaker LRay Villafuerte yesterday said the government could temporarily tap the former radio and television frequencies of ABS-CBN – which failed to secure a new 25-year legislative franchise – as a means to provide alternative distance learning proposed by the DepEd.

Villafuerte said that “exhausting all possible delivery modes such as the use of untapped television and radio frequencies as those vacated by ABS-CBN is important in keeping students engaged” for purposes of mitigating the impact of the global pandemic.

He cited a recent World Bank report, which stated that the global emergency health crisis is “causing more than 1.6 billion children and youth to be out of school in 161 countries or around 80 percent of the world’s students.”

The Philippines is among the countries experiencing a “learning crisis” borne out of COVID-19.

It is in this context that “the reduction in losses in learning require creativity in remote learning strategies,” such as tapping radio and TV as alternative media for teaching purposes, according to the lawmaker.