MACARTHUR, Leyte–Mary Ann Bren, 16, is all thankful to the dormitory set up inside Palale National High School in Mac Arthur, Leyte, saying the place has saved her from stopping on her studies.
Growing up in a family of 12, Bren said that sustaining her education has been a constant challenge of her parents who are both farmers.
‘We are 10 siblings. Our parents have a hard time supporting our studies especially for our allowance and transportation needs,” said Bren from the interior barangay of San Antonio in the said town.
Bren has to walk for an hour just to reach the school.
Yet after she moved into a dormitory room for the girls inside the high school premises, Bren said she found relief.
“It’s much better here, because I will no longer get tired from walking everyday in going to school. I can attend to my classes every day and save my allowance, too,” she said.
Bren stayed in one room along with 12 other girls in the school. Another room is also made for the 13 other boys whose houses are far from the school.
“This is the first time that I am away from my parents. But it’s just fine because this will be for my own good. I was able to adjust to my new environment. This is just little sacrifices for me to finish my studies,” said Bren who wanted to take up tourism degree in college.
“I really want to finish my studies and find work to help my parents,” she said.
Eighteen-year-old Mark Sumaya, an incoming Grade 8 student, said the distance in going to school was difficult for him.
“We are five siblings. Only two finished Grade 6 while the others already got married. I am thankful that I’ve found a new home inside the school so I can finish my high school,” Sumaya said.
He started staying at the dormitory in September 2018 after it opened in August.
Sumaya said that his parents have to spend P800 every month for the rental payment of a motorcycle which they used to take to the school.
“We have to resort to ‘pakyaw’ for our transportation. It would take about two hours if we will walk going to school from our house,” said Sumaya.
The school assigned some faculty members who also resided in the barangay to serve as “managers” or in-charge of the two rooms inside the school.
The student-boarders were given respective assignments from cooking to cleaning their area.
They also eat together, like in a family. The student-boarders have one cooking area and comfort rooms, respectively.
The dormitory “managers” also instilled discipline and values to the student-boarders. On their free time, they also have some form of recreations like playing chess and learning to play the guitar, among others.
On weekends, the students who chose to stay in the school also get the opportunity to earn extra money by tending to crops of some farmers in the barangay or act as “helper” to other teachers and residents in the area.
While the students do not get extra allowance from the school itself, they however get free board and lodging.
The allocated Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE) for Palale National High School is around P38, 555 only. It is being spent for electricity, water, support-learning programs, and other school activities.
While the school’s monthly expenditures have increased due to additional consumption of water and electricity, this did not stop the school and community officials from sustaining the operation of the two-room dormitory for the sake saving the students from dropping out from school.
Before the school only paid about P1,000 for the power and P600 for the water. This time, they are paying about P2,000 for the water and P3,000 for the electricity.
But for Sumaya, he said he is now “focused” on her studies after finding a place in the dormitory.
“I want to become an engineer someday, and hopefully build a bigger dormitory in the school for the next students like me,” he said.
The school leaders also sought technical assistance from Raul Salano, who handled the Drop-Out Reduction Program (DORP) of the Division of Leyte, in bringing in more sponsors and coordinate with other stakeholders for the operation of the dormitory.
DORP is an adherence to the national government’s program of “Education for All.”
It provides intervention program to reduce the high dropout rate and improve learning outcomes among schools both private and public.
More, it increases significantly the achievement level of the Students-at-Risk of Dropping Out (SARDO).
In the case of Palale National High School, the school leaders with the help of the Division and community officials, managed to increase their capabilities to establish, implement, monitor, evaluate and continuously improve the DORP.
The innovation of putting up a dormitory served as its best practice.
With the help of the local government of Mac Arthur, the school’s one story, two-rooms building became a refuge to the students in the interior villages of the town who are at risk of dropping out from their studies.
The Leyte division also envisioned that the project to counter the DORP in Palale will be replicated in all schools in the 40 towns of Leyte and to the rest of the region and the country where many students quit on their studies due to the distance and expenses in going to school.
(Note: The author is a supervisor at the Division of Leyte, handles the Drop-out Reduction Program of the Leyte province)

MAASIN CITY – Governor Damian Mercado expressed his hope that the splitting of Southern Leyte will result to economic benefits to the province.
Mercado, who just won another fresh term during the May 13 midterm elections, was referring to the creation of another congressional district of the province which was principally authored by his brother, Rep. Roger Mercado.
The governor said that with two congressional districts, Southern Leyte could expect more funding from the national government.
Under Republic Act 11198, Southern Leyte’s 17 towns and Maasin City were divided into two congressional districts.
The first district is comprised of the capital Maasin City, and the towns of Macrohon, Padre Burgos, Malitbog, Tomas Oppus, Bontoc and the island town of Limasawa.
The towns of Sogod, Libagon, Liloan, San Francisco, Pintuyan, San Ricardo, Saint Bernard, Anahawan, San Juan, Hinundayan, Hinunangan, and Silago make up the second district.
The governor was also quick to say that the division of the province into two congressional district is not politically-motivated.
“The move to divide the province has nothing to do with politics because our main purpose was to ensure that more projects will come to help and benefits the residents of Southern Leyte,” Mercado added.
He added that once they have two representatives, these officials will now have enough time to visit all 500 barangays of the province.
At present, Rep. Mercado is on hold-capacity as representative of Southern Leyte in the Lower House.
“They say that an election will be held this November,” Gov. Mercado disclosed.
Southern Leyte province plays an important role in the inter-island transportation system of the country, with its two towns, Liloan and San Ricardo as main entry and exit point for roll-on, roll-off going to Mindanao Island.
An agricultural province, Southern Leyte is a top coconut and abaca fiber producer in the region. (ROEL T. AMAZONA)

TACLOBAN CITY- A five-storey building that will serve as the regional office of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) in Region 8 is expected to rise in July next year, about 15 months from now or 450 calendar days.
The groundbreaking ceremony for the office building was held on May 29 at Barangay Diit, Tacloban City, the previous site of the office building which was heavily damaged by super typhoon Yolanda in November 2013.
In his message, Dr. Juan Albaladejo, BFAR regional director said, “With five years in the making, our dream of having a climate resilient and environment-friendly office building has finally become a reality. With our Typhoon Yolanda experience, we designed our building to become storm surge-proof, safe and with state-of-the-art design.”
“We want to get back to Barangay Diit because this is our original home and we want to build our dreams and hopes here, aside from being close to the sea,” he said.
He added that the five-storey building has a floor area of 5,000 square meters at 1,000 square meters per floor while the laboratory section will be located at the 5th floor and other facilities at the upper floors, making them safe from floods and other calamities.
It was learned that BFAR-8 was given a total budget of P260 million in February 2014 from the government’s savings intended for the Yolanda rehabilitation projects.
“Of the total budget, P189 million is allotted for the office building construction and the remaining amount is for the rehabilitation of BFAR facilities like the surveillance and monitoring building and other facilities in Guiuan,” Albaladejo said.
The BFAR official also disclosed that its office has a lot of equipment donated by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) that are temporarily housed in Guiuan, Eastern Samar.
Some of these equipment will be transferred to Tacloban upon completion of the building.
Director Albaladejo also bared that his office will be engaging more projects with JICA like tooling and post-harvest facilities, to cater to the needs of mariculture.
A breathing area will also be provided for the safekeeping of the boats used in law enforcement, in times of inclement weather.
Meanwhile, Philippine Fisheries Development Authority (PFDA) Officer-in-Charge for Technical Services Department, Danilo Axalan said the project, which is a joint venture of PFDA and BFAR, was bidded out in 2018 but was only awarded February this year for some technical reasons.
The contractors for the project, according to Axalan, are the Penacle and Pacific Summit, same contractors awarded for the construction of the Eastern Visayas Regional Medical Center (EVRMC), who are expected to deliver the project efficiently, effectively and within the given timeline.
“Our office, the PFDA and BFAR will jointly supervise and monitor the implementation of the project as we are partners in fisheries management. In this collaboration, BFAR takes charge of the marine resources to include inland waters such as fishponds, while PFDA provides the needed facilities like the fishing docks for the fishing vessels, market halls, among others, to ensure good quality of fishery products,” Axalan said.
The groundbreaking rite was led by the BFAR Director and Assistant Director themselves, with the presence of PFDA and NEDA officials, and a representative from the Pacific Summit. (LDL/GTT/PIA-8, Leyte)

PALO, Leyte – The Philippine National Police (PNP) here in Eastern Visayas continue on their advocacy on anti-bullying in schools.
With the start of the school year on Monday(June 3), Police Regional Office 8 Deputy Regional Director for Administration Brigadier General Ariel Arcenas said that policemen are not only after ensuring that children are safe in going to their schools but are safe while staying inside their school campuses and classrooms.
Arcenas said that they are regularly conducting their information drive among students on the negative effects of bullying to victims and even to those who are behind the bullying.
“We are asking people, especially our students, to refrain bullying others because it is not good,” Arcenas said.
Under Section 2 of Republic Act 10627 or the “Anti-Bullying Act of 2013” it states that bullying refers to any severe or repeated use by one or more students of a written, verbal or electronic expression, or a physical act or gesture directed at another student that has the effect of actually causing or placing the latter in reasonable fear of physical or emotional harm or damage to his property; creating a hostile environment at school for the other student; infringes the rights of the other student at school; or materially and substantially disrupts the education process or the orderly operation of a school.
“We are recommending that the school authorities should act to it first then inform us so we can also react accordingly. If this involves underage children this should be take can by schools and our social welfare workers,” Arcenas said.
More than 1.27 million students from Kindergarten to Grade 12 returned back to their schools on Monday for school year 2019-2020, based on the record of the regional office of the Department of Education.
Of these number 301, 529 are learners who avail the early registration of DepEd conducted in January which targeted Kindergarten, Grade 1, 7, 11 and transferee.
There are 110, 845 learners are in kindergarten, 615,814 are in elementary, 405, 521 are in junior high school while 138, 540 are in senior high school, for his school year.
(ROEL T. AMAZONA)

MAASIN CITY – The construction of multi-million high-rise school building in Liloan National Technical Vocational High School is now up and running in a bid to address shortage of classrooms in Liloan, Southern Leyte, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) field office here reported.
The 3-storey school building currently being constructed will have 15 classrooms equip with comfort rooms, emergency exits, and fire protection facilities. It has an allocation of P46 million funded under last year’s Basic Education Facilities Fund (BEFF) of the Department of Education.
Based on the recent project inspection conducted by DPWH Southern Leyte engineers, ongoing works in the site include pouring of concrete for the tie beam as well as fabricating and placing of steel bars for the beams.
Liloan National Technical Vocational High School, with over 1,000 students, is one of the national high schools of the government carrying out the implementation of the K to 12 program.
“The school building granted to Liloan National Technical Vocational High School aims to cater the increasing number of enrollees here particularly in the Senior High School program. This new school building will be the venue for technical laboratory and workshops that would equip students with technical and vocational skills necessary for future employment,” said DPWH Southern Leyte District Engineer Ma. Margarita Junia.
Junia said the project started on December 3, 2018 and is targeted to be completed on February 3, 2020. She added, the DPWH has been regularly monitoring civil works and is optimistic that the school building will be finished earlier than the set completion date.
“The DepEd in a joint effort with the infrastructure agency will remain relentless in implementing school building projects necessary for educational development,” Junia said. (PR/FMMT)