The Ministry of Basic, Higher and Technical Education in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (MBHTE-BARMM) has begun the pilot of the face-to-face (F2F) classes in three elementary schools in the island province of Tawi-Tawi.
Fatima Abubakar, the Tawi-Tawi schools division superintendent, said Tuesday the three schools have undergone validation by the MBHTE regional team and were found to have full compliance with School Safety Assessment Tools (SSAT) for the pilot run of the F2F classes.
The schools undergoing a four-week pilot of the F2F classes were the Provincial Housing Laboratory School (PHLS) in Bongao, the capital of Tawi-Tawi; Lt. Laja Idanan Elementary School in Sapa-Sapa municipality; and the Corazon Abubakar Iran Memorial Center Elementary School in Tandubas town.
“We have submitted six schools for validation – three priority and three alternates. However, only three schools passed the screening and approval from the regional team,” Abubakar said in a statement.
“We were supposed to have started on February 14 together with Basilan but Tawi-Tawi was still on Alert Level 3 on that particular date,” Abubakar added.
The MBHTE issued a memorandum dated February 17 ordering the Tawi-Tawi schools division to proceed with the pilot of the F2F classes after the province was downgraded to Alert Level 2 from Alert Level 3.
Abubakar instructed the other schools in Tawi-Tawi to prepare for the expansion of the F2F classes after the four-week pilot in the three schools.
“The heads should make their schools ready for this move and hopefully, for the new normal situation,” she said.
PHLS principal Jeba Jalim was glad the validating team has found her school to have complete compliance with the SSAT and selected it for the F2F classes.
“My 1,044 enrollees and 56 teachers including me and my staff are so excited to go back to school after two years of the pandemic caused by Covid-19 (coronavirus disease 2019),” Jalim said.
“Modular distance learning is good but F2F class instruction is better,” she added. (PNA)
