Gatchalian shocked only 966 public schools have anti-bullying committees

Only 966 of the country's public schools have fully functioning child protection committees meant to address the problem of bullying, data from the Department of Education showed.

At a hearing of the Senate Committee on Basic Education on Tuesday, panel chairman Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian indicated that the number was too small compared to the more than 45,000 public schools in the Philippines.

“No wonder magkakaroon tayo ng bullying," Gatchalian said.

(No wonder we have cases of bullying.)

“Nakagulat naman na 966 out of 45,000 [number of schools in the country]. That's only 2% of our total schools,” he noted. 

(It is shocking that 966 out of 45,000. That's only 2% of our total schools.)

Under the implementing rules and regulations of Republic Act No. 10627 or the Anti-Bullying Law passed in 2013, the CPCs are mandated to handle bullying cases in schools.

A CPC is composed of the school head, a guidance counselor, and representatives from among teachers, parents, students, and the community.

Gatchalian questioned the DepEd report which indicated that only 966 out of 3,210 schools that were initially evaluated in November 2024 have fully functioning CPCs.

According to DepEd Assistant Secretary for Operations Dexter Galban, the rest of the 3,210 are currently in the “developing stages” of establishing their respective committees.

Gatchalian pointed out that these CPCs are the same committees that are tasked to prevent, detect, and address bullying in schools. 

For Gatchalian, school principals should be held liable for the failure to ensure that CPCs in all schools are fully functional. 

 

In response, Galban said the DepEd was looking into the possible sanctions that could be imposed against schools that have been unable to operationalize their CPCs. 

“Please be strict about the creation of this CPC dahil mensahe ito e. Kung hindi natin ito nabuo on the ground, mensahe na hindi natin sineseryoso ang bullying sa bansa natin. So this is basic and I want this addressed as well,” Gatchalian said.

(Please be strict about the creation of the CPC because this is a message. If we can't do this on the ground, the message is we're not taking the problem of bullying in our country.)

Apart from this, Gatchalian flagged the delays in the implementation of the GMRC Law. 

“We believe that GMRC will help address bullying by inculcating good manners and right conduct at the beginning of the school-age or the beginning of the schooling of the child. Pero I understand that right now, hindi pa siya fully implemented,” Gatchalian said.

“It’s only implemented in grades 1,4, and 7 this coming school year 2024-2025. But in the IRR of the same law, the shift from teaching Edukasyon sa Pagpapakatao to GMRC and Values Education shall be implemented by School Year 2022-2023 in all public schools," Gatchalian said.

"So dapat in SY 2022-2023 implemented na siya. So why the delay?” he added.

(This should have been implemented in the school year 2022 to 2023. So why the delay?)

Gatchalian pointed out that there are laws already in place to address bullying, but these were not implemented well.

“Without implementing this, hindi natin matatapos itong mga ganitong problema,” Gatchalian said. 

(Without implementing this, we won't solve these problems.)

Galban said the changes that were introduced by the DepEd during the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of shifting of teaching modalities, which he said was followed by the modification of curriculum. 

DepEd Assistant Regional Director Cristito Eco explained that the department prioritized the integration of GMRC until they came up with a revised curriculum. 

“In the previous years, ang ginamit muna namin ay integration but it is also a part of the Values Education. So for now, when we revised the curriculum for Grades 1, 4, and 7 it’s already explicit as a separate subject,” Eco said.

Still, Gatchalian said that the GMRC Law should be fully rolled out by School Year 2025 to 2026. 

“What we demand from this committee is a full implementation of GMRC this coming school year. We cannot wait any more,” he added. 

Galban, in response, said the DepE would hold this as a high-priority intervention” for the school year 2025 to 2026. 

Among the incidents that were investigated by the committee are the cases in Moonwalk National High School and Bagong Silangan High School. 

With the incident in Bagong Silangan High School, Gatchalian reiterated his recommendation to regulate the use of mobile devices inside the schools as these may be used to share cases of bullying online. 

This, he said, might cause “deeper wounds” to the victims as the video of the actual bullying is already all over the internet. 

According to Bagong Silangan High School Principal Marivic Francisco, it was the aunt of the victim who shared the video online and refused to take it down despite their appeal. 

When the video was shared online, Francisco said they were still in the process of resolving the issue among concerned parties. –NB, GMA Integrated News