In Iloilo City, late enrollees urged to enlist before June 6

ILOILO CITY, Philippines — Late enrollees are still welcome to enroll in public schools but the Department of Education-6 is advising them to enroll before June 6.

DepEd-6 assistant director John Arnold Siena said they need to update their data based on June 6 so that they could already request funds for some school repairs and other maintenance from their central office.

"We could still accommodate late enrollees because we could not deprive them but we are also asking their consideration if they could made it before June 6 so that we could finish updating all our school records", he said.

Siena stressed they are expecting around 1.5 million students enrolled in public schools both from elementary and high school for this school year 2014-2015.

The assistance director admitted that lack of classrooms and chairs are still the main problem of most public schools not only in our region but nationwide.

He added the last year typhoon Yolanda also contributed a big factor on the lack of classrooms and chairs since some schools particularly in northern part of Panay Island were mostly damaged.

"Until now some classes held in temporary learning areas just to accommodate their students because the repair and constructions of school facilities face delayed due to procurement processing", he said.

Siena added the DepEd central office has already allocated billions of pesos for the construction of these temporary learning areas while waiting funds for the construction of school buildings.  

In fact, Iloilo has given P 8 million for this project to be given to those typhoon-affected schools.

He said each school beneficiary has given P 30, 000 for the construction of their temporary