GENERAL SANTOS CITY – Public schools in Sarangani province are ready and equipped to face the “new normal” as they gear up for the opening of classes on Monday amid the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic, an Education official assured Friday.
Dr. Donna Panes, curriculum implementation division chief of the Department of Education (DepEd)-Sarangani, said all public schools from kindergarten to senior high school levels in the province’s seven municipalities will start with their formal classes as scheduled through various learning modes.
Panes said the distribution of the learning modules are ongoing in areas covered by the province’s 333 public schools.
She said the modules' reproduction has been fast-tracked by the schools.
“We’re facing a lot of challenges but they are continually addressed, so we are ready so far,” she told PNA in a phone interview.
As of Friday, Panes said around 134,000 learners or about 93 percent of their 145,000 target have already enrolled but still expect the figures to increase as schools continue to accept late enrollees.
Of the enrolled learners so far, she said 80 percent has chosen the modular learning mode while the remaining 20 percent preferred the online, blended, radio and television-based instruction.
She said DepEd-Sarangani has partnered with at least six radio stations based in this city for the radio-based learning and established its own online channel via Facebook for the television instruction.
For the online mode, she said the teachers handling the classes have already completed the dry runs and made the needed adjustments to address possible glitches.
Panes said preparations are also ongoing for the rollout of the Learning Resources on Wi-Fi Hub for Expanded e-Learning or "LR on WHEeLS" program, which will enable students of target schools to access digital documents for learning offline and without using internet load.
She said at least 190 schools have been identified for the "LR on WHEeLS" program, situated mostly in remote areas.
“This is a continuing process as part of the dynamic learning system that we adopted and we’re continually looking for ways to make the delivery more accessible and effective for our learners,” she added. (PNA)
