BACOLOD CITY - The Sagay City Eco-Zone National High School (EZNHS) in Negros Occidental has initiated a program that encourages parents to guide their children with their learning modules at home, while giving them the incentive of getting free vegetables for their efforts.
Dubbed “Module Mo, Veggies Ko”, the program is an initiative of Sagay City EZNHS, in partnership with the city government.
Sagay City EZNHS Teacher-in-Charge Myla Rivera said the program was a way to motivate parents to help their children comply with their Self-Learning Modules (SLM) and continue to enjoy learning at home.
“When a parent returns a learning module, the school will give fresh vegetables from the school's ‘Gulayan sa Eskwelahan,” Rivera said.
Rivera said the program also enabled the school to have more enrollees from 365 in 2019 to 483 this year.
“We’re very glad with the results, and we’re happy that we were able to help since some parents lost their jobs because of the pandemic,” she added.
Rivera said parents have really found time to help their children with the lessons.
She added that module distribution and retrieval of the learning materials have also been on-time.
Rivera said the “Gulayan sa Eskwelahan” started last April 30, after the school faculty and the Parents and Teachers Assembly (PTA) were able to get the approval of the city government to convert a 5,000 square-meter lot in the school’s vicinity into a vegetable garden.
Rivera said the clearing and cultivation of soil started last June 16, followed by its first harvest in September 30.
She said that 100 parents were given about 50 kilos of pechay for free during their first harvest.
The garden has variety of vegetables like tomatoes, eggplants, green beans, cabbage, among others.
The garden is being maintained by five parents of the school under its adopt-a-school Gulayan.
During harvest season, 50 percent of the harvested vegetables in the garden was allotted for the five parents in order for them to also have an income, while the other half was set aside for the learning program.
“These parents were provided with livelihood to support their families amid the pandemic,” she said.
Rivera also thanked the city government headed by Mayor Alfredo Marañon III and the barangay officials for their support.