EDITORIAL - Beyond school refurbishment

With just a week to go before the school year opens, the annual cleanup and refurbishment of public schools has started. President Marcos led the kickoff of Brigada Eskwela yesterday, under which rooms, desks and other learning facilities and equipment are cleaned, restored or replaced.

The refurbishment of facilities should include ensuring proper ventilation and sufficient water supply and sanitation. This should go without saying, but there are still too many schools where water supply is not enough even for regular handwashing – a basic health protocol for keeping out pathogens. There are still public schools without modern toilets and safe water facilities.

Worse than these problems is the lack of classrooms, which the Department of Education has placed at 165,000 for academic year 2025-2026. This acute shortage – triple the 55,000 just 12 years ago – has been attributed by DepEd officials to an ever growing population, with resources in state schools unable to keep up. Schools facing shortages have been compelled to hold classes not just in two but three shifts daily and to have large class sizes.

Apart from the weak capacity to catch up with the growth in student population, the classroom shortage is aggravated by the use of public schools as evacuation centers during disasters. And there are many such calamities throughout the year: destructive typhoons and floods, torrential monsoon rains, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions. In urban centers, families rendered homeless by fires are also given temporary shelter in public schools.

DepEd officials have long asked the government to provide other evacuation facilities, to minimize disruption of classes. So far, local government units that have heeded the call have been in the minority.

Where there are classrooms, the DepEd is also hard-pressed to ensure internet connectivity in schools and to provide the telecommunication devices that have become indispensable for school children to survive and thrive in the digital age. For this fiscal year, unfortunately for learners and educators alike, the 19th Congress slashed the P12-billion budget proposed by DepEd for computers in public schools.

This lack cannot be addressed by any school refurbishment. The government is reportedly eyeing partnerships with the private sector to make up for the funding loss. Business groups particularly the Federation of Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry Inc. already have programs in place to build classrooms and even school buildings in underserved areas.

Beyond Brigada Eskwela, the government must invest more in ensuring that free universal education will have sufficient resources. Free must not mean shortages in school facilities; free must not mean substandard education.