Philippines
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'We're doing all we can': DepEd continues to respond to challenges in education amid the pandemic
'We're doing all we can': DepEd continues to respond to challenges in education amid the pandemic
Since the current school year opened in October, Education Secretary Leonor Briones said that the Department of Education (DepEd) has been trying its best to address existing and emerging issues that affect students, teachers and the education sector - as a whole.
“We, in the DepEd, are doing all we can because our bottom line is: education must continue, learning must continue,” Briones said in an online presser on March 22. “We cannot live with the alternative of closing down our schools at this time,” she added.
Briones said that DepEd has been constantly monitoring what is happening on the ground by asking its local officials to submit reports regularly.
She noted that among the issues reported to DepEd include challenges in learning delivery modalities and the need to make necessary adjustments in some of its programs - among others. “During the months of school closures, we have spent time with the teachers, capacitating them, as well as the learners,” Briones said.
With children cooped up inside their homes for months now, Briones said DepEd has also been getting reports on the impact on their mental health. “We’ve been talking to student councils and they asked us to hold webinars on mental health,” she said.
For months now, Briones said that concerned units of DepEd have been holding mental health sessions. “We have been consulting the experts and how to teach children to cope with change - we are responding as much as we can,” she added.
Briones said that as early as March last year - when the decision for a national lockdown was announced - she has been very clear in her position that education must continue.
“I was alone in my position that we should not close the schools because the schools would be the safest place for children to be in,” Briones said.
However, due to the mandate of President Duterte not to conduct face-to-face classes until deemed safe, Briones said that DepEd is “implementing the policy and the decision because this is a government policy.”
While learning at this time of pandemic remains a challenge, Briones maintained the need to keep on going. “We must continue as we did during the Marawi siege, as we did during the war years - schools continued because education must continue,” she ended.