The provincial Capitol has heavily invested to put the Boholano school children on the solid base of education. Gov. Edgar Chatto has staked his administration’s mind, heart and wallet to give them not just best learning but the soul of it, which is their total development. His top thrusts which are the Dynamic Learning Program (DLP) - Learning Physics as One Nation (LPON) with training for science and math teachers, CPG scholarship, educational subsidy, and bayanihan school building initiative. The most ambitious yet demanded by time and condition is the adoption of the DLP and LPON by all public secondary schools starting this school year, according to the academe. Department of Education (DepEd) – Bohol superintendent Dr. Lorna Rances said the province funded the summer training of teachers for the implementation of the DLP-LPON strategy that has revolutionized the way of teaching. Boholano “mindmates” Drs. Christopher and Ma. Victoria Bernido invented the DLP, a cost-efficient yet most effective learning method, for which the couple earned last year Asia’s equivalent to the global Nobel Prize, the Ramon Magsaysay Awards.

The DLP has been adopted by over 260 high schools in the country since the Bernidos, both former University of the Philippines (UP) professors, introduced it to the Central Visayas Institute Foundation CVIF in Jagna in 2002. Bohol is now the country’s first and only to pilot in a provincewide level the DLP-LPON of the gifted Bernidos, also now monickered as the “soulmates” of Bohol education. One account said Christopher had once written a love letter listing down why Ma. Victoria should marry him. Among these were their shared passion for learning and a mission to build a nation. But it took a purposeful governor of Chatto’s caliber---and Chatto’s passion for brainstorming on all that can possibly upscale school learning process---for the Bernidos’ great method to be finally applied provincewide in Bohol, DepEd people said. DLP’s Bohol-wide implementation involves 1,700 secondary teachers, 139 school heads, 54 district supervisors and and 30 DepEd division personnel.

From their own DLP, the Bernidos, who are theoretical physicists, derived the strategy for the LPON project which has equally amazed both national and international educators. The LPON formula, which answers the problem of severe shortage of physics teachers, has been adopted by the Fund Assistance for Private Education (FAPE) since 2008. Rances said Chatto’s zeal to apply provincewide the Bernido method gained support from Rep. Arthur Yap who has the LPON also adopted by private high schools in the Third District beginning this school year. Chatto hailed the new paradigm that is DLP-LPON for proving strong the proposition that poverty and scarcity are no rooted obstacles to quality education.

BAYANIHAN

The governor also brainstormed with DepEd and other education stakeholders on possible innovations towards quality education amid the perennial problems of lack of school structures, facilities, etcetera. New two-classroom high school buildings were inaugurated in Dagohoy in Inabanga, Cagting in Ubay and Causwagan in Catigbian and Lungsodaan in mabini, as well as elementary classrooms also in Causwagan and in Botoc, Loay over the week in another success story of the bayanihan school building program of the province. It was in Cagting, among other rural areas, where high school students used to hold classes inside a nipa and bamboo hut with the earth ground as its very floor. School buildings thru bayanihan, programmed for long-term partnership to address lack of classrooms and other facilities, will rise on the island town of Pres. Garcia after their groundbreaking on Tuesday. While classes go on, Chatto said the program will build more facilities elsewhere in the province in partnership with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) thru its Bohol units, DepEd, LGUs and private sector. Bayanihan schools are built with comfort rooms, tables, chairs, blackboards, bulletin boards, and power and water connections, apart from add-on computer sets, textbooks, school supplies, even sewing machines.

The governor cited the support from the shopping malls and foundations such as the FCB here, national television network, and Boholanos outside the province, including those abroad. While it works quickly, bayanihan is cost-efficient since the province has to spend only P780,000 instead of P1.3 million up to P1.5 million for each standard two-classroom building. Chatto cited the labor and sweat of the engineering soldiers. The provincial government savings from cheaper bayanihan structures go to additional school accessories, according to the governor. On Friday, Chatto and Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Sec. Gregory Domingo launched in Baclayon the Personal Computers for Public Schools – Phase 4 (PCPS4) benefiting 39 Bohol public high schools. It was timed with the Bohol run of DTI’s Diskwento Caravan bringing to rural area consumers basic necessities and prime commodities, including school supplies, at discounted prices.

SCHOLARSHIPS

There are new 51 recipients of capitol’s Pres. Carlos P. Garcia Scholarship Program in addition to existing college scholars. Rances said DepEd is also implementing the new, separate educational subsidy program, another pet thrust of the Chatto administration, as another approach to assisting poor but deserving students. These are distinct from the revived barangay scholarship which guidelines are already approved by the Board of Regents of the Bohol Island State University (BISU) during its meeting with the governor. Chatto fought in the previous meetings of the board, which is chaired by the chairman of the Commission on Higher Education CHED, for the restoration of the program that the governor supported during his congressional stint. Chatto authored in Congress the BISU law. This is aside from the province’s collaboration with the Department of Agriculture (DA) on scholarship on farm, food productivity and related courses and technologies.

GREEN SCHOOLS, PINK STUDENTS

Rances said DepEd has launched a provincewide search for greenest schools thru vegetable projects pursuant to the Gulayan sa Paraalan Program that Chatto wants faithfully implemented. The governor will have full interest in school vegetable raising rekindled, in the process instilling in the students the values of farm industry, food self-sufficiency and right nutrition at no choking market cost. This complements with the program that teaches basic hygiene and sanitation to the pre-schoolers at Day Care and kindergarten and Grades 1 and 2 pupils. By this they can start learning and putting to practice the essence of being constantly in the pink of health. Utter neglect for sanitation leads to poor health and illnesses, which can cause children to fare lowly in studies, if not stopping schooling at all. Dropping from school can beget lest chance of economic opportunities and personal growth and life outlooks defined in conflicts, which can eventually, in many proven cases, lead to outcast and misfit ways of survival. Rances said capitol supplies the health education and basic hygiene kits to the preschool children and early graders. Physical fitness is gradually enhanced into higher levels of discipline and endurance thru the sports development program on which the Chatto administration likewise partners with the academe.

NON-FORMAL EDUCATION

Chatto at the same time keeps his support for technical-vocational and non-formal education not just for literacy but livelihood capability of out-of-school youths and adults. He led the monthly capitol convocation on Monday during which the Bureau of Alternative Learning System (ALS) of DepEd launched the eSkwela, a skills education project aided by information and communications technology (ICT). The project has e-modules for tech-voc trainings that can meet the manpower needs of such earning industries as tourism, which involves numerous job-granting sectors and sub-sectors. Chatto, City DepEd head Dr. Norma Varquez and ALS supervisor Dr. Crestianita Caga inked the agreement on the project as witnessed by manager Marilou Makinano of the Bohol Crisis Intervention Center (BCIC), where the eSkwela learning facility is housed, DSWD Provincial Director Carmelita Tecson, and Provincial Administrator Alfonso Damalerio II, among others. Education has thus sparked not just learning itself but practically all the intents of Chatto’s strategy HEAT----Health and sanitation, Education and technology, Agriculture and food security, Tourism and livelihood. (Ven rebo Arigo)