DepEd: 75,242 new teaching positions to bring down teacher-student ratio

The Department of Education (DepEd) is aiming to further bring down the teacher-student ratio in public schools following the Budget Department's approval of hiring 75,242 new public school teachers.

DepEd Undersecretary for Planning and Field Operations Jesus Mateo said schools in Metro Manila with high student population will benefit from the creation of teaching positions for kindergarten and elementary, junior high school and senior high school for school year 2018-2019.

In a statement posted on DepEd website, Mateo said that reducing the class size, classroom-pupil and teacher-student ratios is one way of improving the quality of education in public schools.

"Yung (teacher-student) ratio, ang average natin 1:33 sa elementary, 1:28 sa secondary pero siyempre sa ibang schools sa Metro Manila iba ratio doon," Mateo told GMA News in an interview.

Mateo explained applicants may go to DepEd divisions in their areas to submit the required documents. Applicants will also be required to demonstrate their teaching methods.

"Sa kinder to grade 10 kailangan LET (Licensure Exams for Teachers) passer pero pagdating sa senior high school tumatanggap tayo ng application na hindi pa LET passer kasi dito kailangan natin ng specialization," Mateo stated.

Of the 75,242 teaching positions created, 40,642 slots are for kindergarten/elementary while 34,244 are for junior high school. For senior high school, 356 new teaching positions have been created.

These are distributed to the country's 12 regions as well as the NCR, CARAGA, CAR and ARMM.

The three regions allowed to hire the most number of teachers are Region 4A (Calabarzon) with 11,186 new teaching positions, Region 3 (Central Luzon) with 8,019 and Region 7 (Central Visayas) with 6,317. 

With the hiring of new teachers, DepEd Secretary Leonor Briones told GMA News that there is a need to continue building additional classrooms in public schools.

Briones said there is an effort to purchase land for school sites and build multistorey school buildings.

Act Teachers party-list Representative Antonio Tinio welcomed the opening of new teaching positions for public schools but reminded the Education Department of the need to hire non-teaching staff in order to unburden teachers of paper work and record-keeping tasks and enable them to focus more on teaching their students. —ALG, GMA News