The country’s top universities namely, the University of the Philippines, University of Santo Tomas (UST), Ateneo de Manila University and De La Salle University (DLSU) are reportedly open to the proposal to change the school calendar but have not made a final decision.
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| UST students inside a classroom. Big schools are pushing for a change in the academic calendar. |
There were several proposals filed in Congress in previous years, all seeking to move the opening of the school year to September.
If the school calendar is revised, the academic year would run from September to June instead of the June-March cycle.
Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez initiated another proposal, which he said is in support of the initiative of four private schools to delay the annual opening of classes by at least two months starting next year.
He said his measure “is intended to meet the urgent and reasonable need to protect the health, safety and overall wellbeing of schoolchildren and student youth by adopting a school calendar most suited to Philippine climatic conditions.”
“The months of June and August are the most rainy months, when there is an occurrence of the greater number of typhoons and monsoon rains. During these months, schoolchildren are subjected to the irregularity of school days due to rains and floods and horrendous difficulties in commuting to and from school,” he said.
Rodriguez added that moving the start of the school year to September would also benefit Filipinos working or relocating abroad, where most schools also open in September.
Under the bill co-authored by Rodriguez’s brother Maximo, who represents party-list group Abante Mindanao, the school year for pre-elementary, elementary and high schools would last 220 days, divided into two semesters of 110 days each.
The first semester would be first week of September to the second week of January, and the second semester would be from third week of January to the last week of May.
In the tertiary level, there would be three semesters of 73 days each.
The Department of Education (DepEd) and the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) would be mandated to issue implementing rules and regulations.
The CHED is reportedly looking into the proposals of UP, DLSU and UST that classes should start in September, instead of June, beginning next year.
The schools said this would prepare them for the ASEAN Economic Community in 2015 by synchronizing their school calendars with those of educational institutions in the region.
The Philippines is said to be the only member of ASEAN that starts the academic year in June.--Source: Philstar