Walking 3 hours to School Daily

I was saddened with the state of the Philippine schools, especially the one featured in this Sine Totoo episode. With tattered blackboards, no electricity, school buildings that are about to collapse (if there is a school building to speak of), a lack of desks and chairs, books, and supplies for an average of 120 students in a classroom, the Philippines ranks 41 out of 45 in Asian countries in Math and Science.

Check out the video HERE.
Wouldn't it be great to raise funds and build a small classroom per village?

Walking for textbooks

In an effort to get textbooks into the far-flung Philippine classrooms in time for school, volunteers from the communities offered to help by distributing textbooks to their local schools. Instead of waiting for the bureaucratic red tape to clear, parents, teachers, and students walk from their Dep Ed office to deliver the textbooks to their proper destinations.

DepEd is adopting “Textbook Walk" this schoolyear to help ensure that more schools get their textbooks on time. It is designing the scheme after “Brigada Eskwela" wherein communities help refurbish and get schools ready for the school opening by contributing cash, kind or labor. Last year, 26,000 schools signed up for Brigada Eskwela and received P2 billion worth of materials and man-hours.

The deliveries culminate into a celebration or fiesta. And there is reason to celebrate.

Redempto Parafina of the Ateneo School of Government said Textbook Walk hopes to reduce delays in the delivery of textbooks to elementary schools, especially those in the remote areas.

He said the project also focuses on the importance of community participation in the distribution of textbooks.

“By organizing a festive event that facilitates the delivery of textbooks from the districts to elementary schools, the citizens’ demand for good governance is dramatized," said Parafina.

DepEd suppliers deliver textbooks directly to the country’s 6,439 public high schools.

Read the whole article HERE.