DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 15 Feb) – As community restrictions here further eased, the City Government of Davao has allowed schools in Davao City to resume face-to-face classes after two years of remote learning due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), Mayor Sara Duterte said.
In her program streamed live over her Facebook page, Duterte said the city will not oppose the decision of schools should they decide to allow in-campus classes for students, provided that there will be strict compliance with the minimum public health standards (MPHS) to avoid contracting the infection.
She told private and public basic education institutions to apply for resumption of face-to-face classes with the Department of Education (DepEd) while colleges and universities or higher education institutions with the Commission on Higher Education (CHED).
Duterte said the city can learn from the practices of schools in Metro Manila that reopened in-campus classes.
“We leave that to the schools to decide if they want face-to-face because our DepEd and CHED have guidelines, and schools in Manila, National Capital Region, have already started reopening. They have face-to-face classes, so we are not without examples on how to start again and go back to face-to-face classes,” she said.
The mayor said the local government of Davao has not received any report from DepEd-Davao about any untoward incident from the five pilot schools in the city that have been allowed to resume face-to-face classes.
“I would surmise that the absence of any report would mean that the conduct of face-to-face classes is okay because, so far, we have not received report from DepEd that anything occurred with rollout of face-to-face classes,” she said.
Duterte told the schools to comply with MPHS, particularly wearing of face mask, physical distancing, and frequent handwashing of students to minimize risk of contracting COVID-19.
She said the local government wants to gradually restore other activities here.
“Our direction is that we will be Dabawenyos living with COVID-19. We cannot wait for the time to come that we are COVID-free or that there is eradication of COVID because we do not know if COVID will ever go away.
What we shall do is we continue on with MPHS and slowly restore all the activities that have been restricted previously,” she said.
