According to local authorities in Laguna province, the first week of the much-anticipated return of face-to-face classes after two years of distance learning due to the Covid-19 pandemic has been, for the most part, peaceful and orderly.
Of course, first-day blues such as confusion over the health protocols being implemented due to the still prevailing pandemic, heavy traffic and the anxiety of children who have returned to the school environment are inevitable.
Other than that, teachers and school officials said that the return of in-person classes have been normal.
Unfortunately, that normal still meant the lack of classrooms for a growing number of students, especially considering that Calabarzon posted the “highest-ever” number of enrollees for academic year 2021-2022.
While we watch education officials bicker over “overpriced” school supplies (during which a congressman coined the oxymoron to end all oxymorons, “honest corruption”), local school officials are forced once again to make do with the still-persistent problem of the lack of classrooms and school supplies.
As this paper has pointed out earlier, in all fairness, some local government units in the province have gone above and beyond their duty to assist our schools in their need for additional facilities as we enter the “new normal”.
But it appears that the national government is not doing its best efforts to really educate our students. The recent reports of budget slashes to higher institutions of learning for next year seem to confirm that.
This should not have been the “new normal” that our students and teachers have to face.
It’s a slap in the face of those who have faced the challenges of two years of distance learning, during which our government should have done its job in ensuring that our children will come back to school in an “optimum” school environment.