While public schools can still accept late enrollees, the Department of Education (DepEd) on Thursday, Aug. 24, reminded parents and guardians not to wait until the first day of classes to enroll the children for this school year.
“Papayagan pa rin natin ‘yung late enrollees pero hindi natin sila hinihikayat na magpa-late kaya sana mas maaga, mas mabuti (We will still allow late enrollees but we are not encouraging them to enroll late, it's better if they enroll earlier), said DepEd Assistant Secretary and Deputy Spokesperson Francis Cesar Bringas in a DZBB interview.
The enrollment for School Year (SY) 2023-2024 started on Aug. 7. The last day, Bringas said, will be on Aug. 26.
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“Ine-encourage natin ‘yung mga parents na i-enlist na ‘yung kanilang mga anak bago pa ang pasukan para makasama sila sa programming ng ating schools (We are encouraging parents to enlist their children before the start of classes so that they can be included in our schools' programming,” he explained.
Expected enrollment
As of Aug. 23, DepEd has recorded around 18.8 million enrollees for the incoming school year.
READ:
https://mb.com.ph/2023/8/24/dep-ed-enrollment-for-sy-2023-2024-reaches-18-8-million
DepEd said that this figure included public and private schools, State Universities and Colleges / Local Universities and Colleges (LUCs) that offer basic education as well as Philippine Schools Overseas.
During the launch of 2023 Oplan Balik Eskwela, DepEd said for this SY, it was expecting “28 million learners” who will troop to more than 47,000 schools nationwide.
READ:
https://mb.com.ph/2023/8/15/dep-ed-expects-28-million-enrollees-for-sy-2023-2024-1
While DepEd has not reached its expected number of enrollees so far, Bringas said that the department remained confident that the numbers will increase in the coming weeks.
“Confident naman ang department na during the first week, magakakaroon na tayo ng ating final na number or totoong numero (The department is confident that during the first week, we will have our final or actual enrollment numbers),” Bringas said.
He explained that enrollment figures come from the Learner Information System (LIS) in the regions then forwarded to the DepEd Central database.
“Maaring marami pa sa mga schools natin ang hindi pa nakakapag-update ng kanilang LIS so eventually, makikita din natin yung final number natin during the first two weeks of classes (There might be many schools that haven't updated their LIS yet, so eventually, we will see our final numbers during the first two weeks of classes),” Bringas said.
Classes in public schools will start on Aug. 29.
READ:
https://mb.com.ph/2023/8/3/classes-in-public-schools-for-sy-2023-2024-to-start-on-aug-29-dep-ed