he Local Government Units and some public and private schools in Metro Manila and nearby provinces have

already announced the suspension of classes for tomorrow, August 20, 2013 due to bad weather and flooding brought about by Typhoon Maring and the Habagat.

Manila, Philippines --- For many students, it was an entire week of "vacation" as classes in some schools remain suspended today. But, if the Department of Education (DepEd) were to decide, classes in affected areas should resume "once the schools are restored as a safe and conducive learning environment" so students can catch up on the lessons they have missed due to lost school days. Due to the flooding caused by the southwest monsoon (habagat) that was enhanced by tropical storm "Maring" early this week, officials announced the suspension of classes in the following: Metro Manila Makati (all levels) Malabon (all levels) Marikina (all levels) Pasay (all levels) Taguig (all levels) Muntinlupa (pre-school to high school) Valenzuela (pre-school to high school) Pateros (pre-school to high school, public only) Outside Metro Manila Calumpit, Bulacan (all levels) Paombong, Bulacan (all levels) Malolos, Bulacan (all levels) Laguna (all levels) Montalban, Rodriguez (all levels) San Mateo, Rizal (all levels) Cainta, Rizal (preschool to high school) Schools Asia Pacific College De La Salle-Araneta University De La Salle University-Science and Technology Complex and Makati campuses Mapua Institute of Technology Makati Manila Tytana Colleges Miriam College Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Valenzuela Rainbow Institute of Learning, Inc. Pila, Laguna

San Beda College of Law-Manila San Pedro College of Business Administration St. Paul College-Pasig St. Scholastica's College-Manila University of Asia and the Pacific University of Perpetual Help-Bian Xavier School Nuvali University of the Philippines-Los Baos Valenzuela Polytechnic College

Philippines needs a climate change awareness campaign

Advertising and media agencies discussed the vital role of the industry in building critical mass awareness for climate change the day after Tropical Storm Trami left the country in devastation
Several cities and provinces in the Philippines were awash in floods due to Tropical Storm Trami, signifying the urgency to have a stronger climate change awareness in the country. Image: Romeo Ranoco, Reuters

The Philippines needs a strong national response to climate change, something that is lacking despite the fact that it is acutely vulnerable to its effects, said experts at the Asian Development Bank headquarters in Manila on Thursday. Speaking about the work of the Climate Change Commission, vice chairperson Secretary Lucille Sering said, Were supposed to be incharge of probably the biggest awareness campaign our country will ever face, and yet I couldnt even get our national government to sit on a meeting so we can understand how we could get our people involved. She said a majority of Filipinos have personally felt the effects of climate change, and yet most have done nothing to reduce it. Worse still, a portion of the population do not know what climate change is. The lack of knowledge and confusion is mirrored in other sectors of society, including some businesses, local public offices, and journalists who report on the issue.

A majority of Filipinos have personally felt the effects of climate change, and yet most have done nothing to reduce it. Worse still, a portion of the population do not know what climate change is.
The need to discuss climate change and how to mitigate its effects have become more urgent now, said Ging Reyes, head of integrated news and current affairs of ABS-CBN, one of the countrys main media companies. Reyes, along with Sec. Sering and other experts, shared their perspectives at a one-day seminar called, Building Critical Mass Awareness of Climate Change engaging Media, Advertising and Entertainment Sectors. The talk was organised by the Singapore-based Asia-Pacific Media Alliance for Social Awareness, also known as The Media Alliance, with the support of the ADB.

The seminar comes just a day after Manila suffered its worst flooding yet for the year due to Tropical Storm Trami. The thirteenth tropical storm to hit the Philippines this 2013, Trami intensified the seasonal southwest monsoon rains, leaving at least 17 people dead and over one million people affected. It has cost the country over $1.7 million worth of damages, in both infrastructure and agriculture.

Media has a part to play

Satinder Bindra, principal director for external relations at ADB, opened the session and said, There is a need for change and inspiration at this moment. Experts said the media and advertising industries have a key role to play since it can shape peoples perception. The rest of the private sector, likewise, can help reduce climate change through their influence on public consumption. The question is, according to the organisers, How do they, and can they, work together to address critical mass awareness fo r a rapid national, regional and global response to climate change? For Oscar M. Lopez, keynote speaker and chairman emeritus of the Lopez Group of Companies, which owns the Manila Electric Company and the Energy Development Corporation, part of the solution is acknowledging that carbon emissions contribute to climate change and a multi-sector approach is needed to address it. He said, The Philippines releases an insignificant percentage of the greenhouse gases compared to that generated by industri al countries. And yet, even if the Philippines was a carbon-neutral country, it would still be one of the most affected countries due to climate change. He added that this is also because of the countrys geography, located in the worlds Ring of Fire, where earthquakes and vol canic eruptions are frequent, and being in the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone, or the area where the northern and southern hemisphere winds meet.

Little knowledge of climate change in the Philippines

Apart from this, Sec. Sering said the many other challenges facing the countrys climate change mitigation efforts. The reality is that while 85 per cent of respondents have suffered from climate change based on a recent survey commissioned by the World Bank, about 38 per cent have only little understanding of the issue. The rest, or 12 per cent, said they had extensive to partial but sufficient (35 per cent) knowledge and those who have almost no understanding, which figured at 14 per cent. The findings are not surprising, said Sec. Sering and and Lopez. Both mentioned a lack of dialogue, research and a deep disconnect between the national and local levels of government. Creating mass awareness is difficult when the leaders themselves cannot be an authority on the matter, said the secretary. Even Filipino journalists need training on the subject, admitted news chief Reyes. Voltaire Tupaz, multimedia reporter at news social media site Rappler, revealed that he has to make his stories sexy to gen erate views. Otherwise, the most number of hits relating to climate change would be mostly on the suspension of school classes due to typhoons and floods, he said.

Role of the private sector

Jones Campos, executive director of the Advertising Board of the Philippines, added that companies must be sustainable to address climate change. Instead of fire-fighting and being always reactive to natural disasters, companies can help by advocating conservation.

Sustainability, he defined, is when companies become financially viable, socially responsible and caring for the environment all at the same time. He cited firms like Metro Pacific Investment Corporation, which conducts environmental initiatives such as mangrove planting and coastal and underwater clean up. Amor Maclang, founding director of Geiser Maclang Marketing Communications, said that endemic to our day-to-day work should be the consciousness about the environment and being able to do good and do well at the same time. Climate change mitigation is not a typical campaign. It is not about sending press releases or creating catchy taglines, she said. Companies have to realise that communicating is finding out what is best for everyone involved. For instance, there was a push for mining in Palawan last year, but they were able to help ban mining on 78 eco-tourism sites. The mineral wealth of the Philippines is $840 billion and we assisted advocates like Gina Lopez, for example, and everyone from indigenous people to lawmakers to leave it in the ground because eco-tourism is a better economic alternative to communities than mining, Maclang shared. Accountability was part of the reason this campaign was successful, and it has to be the same with any type of business or organisation. Fast-moving consumer good companies and real estate firms, she said, must be challenged to be more accountable, since their industries greatly affect land and resource use, which have environmental consequences. Full disclosure is a necessity. As she puts it, share of the market means share of the responsibility. In the same vein, Reyes said that media agencies have to provide substantial information to raise climate change awareness as this helps avoid loss of lives in times of natural disasters. It is also about giving a face to climate change to make the story more relatable to the public or using citizen journalists to provide a laymans point of view, added Tupaz. As example, he presented video clips of footages given by concerned citizens showing raging floods in hard to reach, rural communities. He also showed a video report of local residents in Cateel, Davao Oriental, who were trying to rebuild their town that was ripped apart by Typhoon Bopha late last year. According to Tupaz, The Filipino spirit is resilient, but infrastructure is not.
A slideshow of photos of the flood caused by the southwest monsoon rains that lashed Metro Manila on Sunday night until Monday. The photos were taken on St. Paul Road, Barangay San Antonio, in Makati City mid-afternoon Monday. CONTRIBUTED PHOTOS Tropical Storm Maring may develop into a typhoon before it leaves the Philippines on Thursday, with its intensification of the southwest monsoon expected to bring heavy rains to Luzon, including Metro Manila, until Wednesday. Torrential rains brought by Maring (international name: Trami) shut down Metro Manila on Monday. The government called off classes in schools and most private businesses suspended work due to flooding caused by incessant rains that started on Sunday morning. Classes are suspended at all levels in Metro Manila on Tuesday except in Pasig, Mandaluyong, Marikina, Navotas and Valenzuela cities where there will be no classes only at the preschool, elementary and high school levels. Rising floodwaters forced people in many parts of the metropolis and nearby provinces to flee their homes and stay in government-run shelters. The national disaster agency reported three people, including a 5-year-old boy, killed, and two others missing in northern Luzon and civil defense officials in the Calabarzon region reported two people drowned after an irrigation dike in Tanza town, Cavite province, collapsed. Price freeze To stop unscrupulous traders from taking advantage of the situation, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) imposed a freeze on the prices of basic goods in several areas in Luzon that had declared a state of calamity. Victorio Mario A. Dimagiba, officer in charge of the consumer welfare and business regulation group at the DTI, said that as of noon Monday, prices should have already been frozen in two towns in Ilocos Sur (Sta. Maria and Narvacan), two towns in Laguna (Sta. Rosa and San Pedro), and Cavite. Dimagiba said the freeze remained in effect until the lifting of the states of calamity. A prize freeze covers rice, bread, coffee, milk, noodles and sardines, among other basic goods. Heavy rains blamed President Aquino blamed the extensive flooding on heavy rains brought by Maring, aggravated by high tide at around 1 a.m. Monday. Heavy rain is anything above 7.5 millimeters per hour, Aquino said in a speech at Ateneo de Manila University. Now here, we have 30 mm within one hour, or if rainfall has continued for the past three hours and is more than 65 mm, he said, reading an advisory from the st ate weather bureau.

ROLLING STORE TAXI An ambulant food vendor converts his store into a water taxi to earn extra by ferrying commuters across flooded portions of Gil Puyat Avenue in Makati City on Monday. NIO JESUS ORBETA

Aquino said residents of low-lying areas were advised on Sunday night to move to safer grounds, and that Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) personnel began to clear the Metro roads of storm debris and trash on Sunday night. There are no fresh instructions, Aquino said. Instructions had been given at the start, with the very first storm that we encountered. Jori Loiz, a senior forecaster at the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) said Maring, as of 4 p.m. Monday, was observed to have maintained its strength and was almost stationary for 12 hours as it began to make a U-turn for Taiwan. Loiz said Maring was 580 kilometers east of Itbayat town, Batanes province, with maximum sustained winds of 75 kilometers per hour near the center and gusts of 90 kph, moving east-northeast at 7 kph. Low pressure Loiz said low pressure in the northeast, outside the Philippine area of responsibility, was hampering the movement of Maring, a normal occurrence when two weather disturbances interact. Being the dominant weather disturbance, Maring may simply absorb the low pressure, or this weaker weather disturbance may just dissolve, Loiz said. Loiz alerted Metro Manila, the Ilocos region, Central Luzon, Calabarzon and Panay Island, as well as the provinces of Benguet and Occidental Mindoro, to the possibility of monsoon rains, which could generate flash floods and landslides. The Zamboanga Peninsula, northern Mindanao, as well as the rest of Luzon and the Visayas will have cloudy skies with light to moderate rain showers and thunderstorms while the rest of Mindanao will be partly cloudy to cloudy with isolated rain showers or thunderstorms. The estimated rainfall within the 300-kilometer diameter of the storm was heavy to intense at 10 mm per hour to 25 mm per hour, but Maring was expected to continue to intensify the southwest monsoon and bring moderate to heavy rainshowers and thunderstorms, mostly over the western section of Luzon. The western section of Luzon includes Metro Manila; the Ilocos Region; Zambales; La Union; Pangasinan; Bataan; Laguna; Cavite; Batangas; the Mindoro provinces, and Palawan. Loiz cautioned fishermen, particularly those using small vessels, against venturing out to the seas off Luzon due to possible big waves generated by the southwest monsoon. May become typhoon Loiz said that it was possible for Maring to develop into a typhoon as it hovered over the Pacific Ocean. Although Maring was far from the countrys land mass, it was expected to continue to intensify the southwest monsoon and brin g rains to Luzon until Wednesday, Loiz said. But compared to last year, when heavy rains lasted for several days, the southwest monsoon did not dump too much rain on Luzon this time, as there were long periods without rain. From 8 a.m. Sunday to 5 a.m. Monday, Pagasas Sangley Point rainfall monitoring station in Cavite recorded 335 mm rainfall in 24 hours. The weather bureaus Port Area station in Manila recorded 277.5 mm rainfall; the Ninoy Aquino International Airport station, 255 mm; and the Sinait, Ilocos Sur, station, 211.8 mm. State of calamity Executive Director Eduardo del Rosario of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC), speaking at a meeting of the council at Camp Aguinaldo yesterday, said the governments emergency r esponse efforts were focused on the worst-hit provinces, Laguna and Cavite, which had declared a state of calamity. Del Rosario said the heavy rainfall in Sangley, Cavite, and an irrigation dam that collapsed in Tanza inundated the province. Vicente Tomazar, director of the Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, Quezon) Office of Civil Defense, said parts of Cavite and Laguna remained under water after the dike collapsed. Flooded were the towns of Tanza, Rosario, Bacoor, Noveleta and Carmona in Cavite. In Laguna the towns of San Pedro, Bian and Sta. Rosa were flooded. Tomazar said there were 11 evacuation centers in Laguna and Cavite. Floodwaters began to recede by noon Monday in a few areas, leaving most of Laguna and Cavite under water. Most of the two provinces were cut off from Metro Manila with floodwaters along the South Luzon Expressway rising as high as 1.2 meters. Disaster officials Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa presided over the NDRRMC meeting, attended by Cabinet Secretaries Voltaire Gazmin (Defense), Mar Roxas (Interior and Local Government), Corazon Soliman (Social Welfare and Development), Rogelio Singson (Public Works and Highways), and Herminio Coloma (Communications); Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) Chair Francis Tolentino and Pagasa Officer in Charge Vicente Malano. Ochoa appealed to the public to stay indoors and limit traveling as Maring continued to intensify the southwest monsoon, causing heavy rains. We are advising the public not to travel as much Be vigilant. Those who are in the evacuation centers should stay put and should not return to their homes until they are given clearance to do so, Ochoa said in Filipino. Preparing for worse Del Rosario said all first responders and the local chief executives in Central Luzon were preparing for any possibility. Del Rosario said the evacuation in areas considered critical or risky began Sunday.

Roxas said he had ordered the Philippine National Police to activate its disaster incident management task groups in areas affected by the storm. I have directed the PNP to coordinate with the local disaster risk reduction and management councils to see how the police c an be of assistance to them, Roxas said in a statement. Roxas, vice chair of the NDRRMC, said the PNP had prepared a response checklist for responding to typhoons, flooding and other natural disasters such as tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Four dead Three people were killed at the height of the monsoon rains. The NDRRMC identified the fatalities as Celedenonio Gamban, 39, who drowned in Tanza; Austin Betasolo, 5, who was killed after a fence collapsed in Barangay (village) Tatalo, Binangonan, Rizal province, and Franco Pedrito Cawayan, 30, of Besao, Mountain Province. Cawayan was killed on Sunday after the jeepney he was riding in along with 49 others met an accident in Sitio Caluat, Cabugao, Apayao province. Nine other passengers were injured in the accident. They were taken to Connor District Hospital and Tuguegarao Hospital where Cawayan was declared dead. In Pampanga province, Renato Lacsamana, 64, a former village watchman in Lubao town, drowned Monday morning as he went out to check the water level at the Porac-Gumain River in Barangay Sta. Cruz, the provincial disaster office said. Missing Four people were reported missing. They were identified as Joros Miyage, 7, of Tanza who was reported to have drowned; Marissa Manaois, 40, who was reported trapped in Sumaguing Cave in Sagada, Mountain Province; Rosalino Calantay, 30, who went missing after he tried to cross the Damangil River in Barangay Amtuagan in Tubo town in Abra province; and Monching Bakidan, 20, was also reported missing after he tried to cross the Chico River in Sitio Pampang, Barangay Samoki in Bontoc, Mountain Province. Pagasa official Esperanza Cayanan scotched speculations that there was a delay in the weather bureaus warning system about the ra ins because the Doppler radar in Tagaytay City was under repair. The Doppler radar is still being tested We cannot depend on it right now because it is still being repaired and it is operating on a testing mode. But we are confident about the Doppler radar in Subic, Cayanan said. She said the Doppler radar in Tagaytay was hit by lightning in May. The MMDAs Tolentino convened the metropolitan disaster council on Monday as rain continued to lash the city. Tolentino said at least 807 families from different parts of the metropolis had been evacuated to safer grounds as floodwaters began to rise in their communities. He said he expected a bigger problem if the rains persisted through the night. Incessant rain and flooding shut down schools at all levels, closed government offices, including the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda), which should have begun observing its 19th anniversary on Monday. The Senate and the Supreme Court also called off work and the Department of Foreign Affairs suspended consular services at its headquarters and main consular offices at Aseana Business Park in Paraaque City. Embassies closed The US Embassy shut down operations and the British Embassy suspended consular services, but not its visa operations. Other embassies remained operating, among them the missions of the European Union, France, Australia, Canada, Japan and Israel. The countrys two biggest airlines, Philippine Airlines and Cebu Pacific, temporarily waived rebooking fees for passengers who fa iled to make their flights on Monday due to the bad weather. Heavy rains that started Saturday flooded towns in several provinces in central and northern Luzon, forcing evacuation of people living along waterways. In Ilocos Sur province, the local councils of Candon City and the towns of Sta. Maria and Narvacan declared a state of calamity on Monday. Flooding was also reported in the provinces of Bulacan, Pampanga, Bataan, Zambales and Pangasinan. Tourists rescued In Mountain Province, rescuers began the search for Manaois, who is from Pangasinan, after pulling out 30 tourists and guides from the flooded Sumaguing Cave in Sagada town. The tourists, including 13 Japanese, had been huddled inside the cave since Sunday as strong rains battered parts of the Cordillera region. Also rescued were five residents of Metro Manila, two from Pampanga, two from Natonin town, also in Mountain Province, and eight local tourist guides, police said. Four of those rescued were taken to St. Theodore Hospital in Sagada: Vilma Pusao and Aiza Lifano of Natonin, and Jun Bendiola and an unidentified resident of Metro Manila. The Japanese tourists were examined at the hospital then discharged, police said. The Filipino tourists returned to their hotels, police said. Lake rising Meanwhile, the Laguna Lake Development Authority (LLDA) said the water level in the lake rose overnight from 11.6 meters to 12.1 meters. The lakes critical level, or the maximum annual level, is 12.5 meters, according to LLDA hydrologist Emil Hernandez. [Going] beyond this level would mean the lake [exceeded] its volume capacity. [This] may trigger more than a monthlong lakes hore flooding like what happened after (Tropical Storm) Ondoy (in 2009) and the [monsoon rains last year], Hernandez, who is also an engineer, sai d. As of 4 p.m. Monday, the water level in the lake was 12.1 meters, he said, adding that it was likely to rise further.With reports from Marlon Ramos, TJ A. Burgonio, Cathy Yamsuan, Tarra Quismundo, Dona Z. Pazzibugan, Christine O. Avendao, Nina P. Calleja, Amy R. Remo and Miguel R. Camus in Manila; Maricar Cinco and Romy Ponte, Inquirer Southern Luzon; Tonette Orejas, Carmela Reyes-Estrope, Anselmo Roque, Jun Malig, Armand Galang and Cesar Villa, Inquirer Central Luzon; and Gabriel Cardinoza, Yolanda Sotelo, Kimberlie Quitanol, Leoncio Balbin Jr. and Vincent Cabreza, Inquirer Northern Luzon

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Guidelines on the suspension of classes when typhoonsPresentation Transcript

By the President of the Philippines EO No. 66 dtd January 9, 2012 Prescribing rules on the cancellation or suspension of classes and work in Government offices due to typhoons, flooding, other weather disturbances and calamities

PAGASA- Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council

DOST PAGASA Recom OCD Endorse ment NDRRM C Directive CHED DEPED Memo circular/S uspensio n of classes/ Announc ements MEDIA GEN. PUBLIC Source: NDCC Memorandum No. 9, s. 2007

Dated May 28, 2012 Guidelines on the Implementation of EO No. 66 Storm Signal No. 1: Public and Private Preschool and Kindergarten Classes in the affected areas shall be automatically cancelled or suspended

Storm Signal No. 2: Public and Private Preschool, Kindergarten, Eleme ntary and Secondary Classes in the affected areas shall be automatically cancelled or suspended

Storm Signal No. 3: Work in all DepEd offices in the affected areas shall be automatically cancelled or suspended

Depending on signal numbers declared at 10:00 PM 4:00 AM (Whole day classes) Depending on signal numbers declared at 11:00 AM (Afternoon classes)

In the absence of typhoon signal warnings from PAGASA, localized cancellation/ suspension of classes in both public and private schools and work in government offices may be implemented by LOCAL CHIEF EXECUTIVES

LOCAL CHIEF EXECUTIVES is the Chairpersons of the Local Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (LDRRMC) Republic Act 10121 or the Philippine Disaster Risk Reductio n and Management Act of 2010 (dtd May 27)

School Heads (SH) May only cancel or suspend classes in cases where urgent action is needed to prevent loss of life or bodily harm.

Local Government Executives as Chairperson of the LDRRMC, in coordination with the National DRRMC

Regional and Division shall active their Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Offices (DRRMO) to monitor the situation and keep lines of communications

Standard reporting procedures between Regional and Division DRRMOs with the Ce ntral Office DRRMO applies

Automatic cancellation/ suspension of classes after it is officially published by PAGASA

In cases where the PAGASA has not raised any storm signal warning or declared presence of a tropical cyclone, the Regional and Division DRRMOs to communicate with RDRRMC and LDRRMC for decision to cancel or suspend classes in their respective Locality

The parents have the ultimate responsibility for determining whether their children should go to school, even if NO order for cancellation/ suspension has been issued

Parents and Teachers: That the required number of school days for the SY shall be considered specially in holding MAKE- UP classes to offset the days when classes are cancelled/ suspended

MAKE- UP CLASSES Shall be held on Saturdays or on Weekdays beyond the originally set school calendar in both public and private schools

SCHOOL DESIGNATED AS EVACUATION CENTERS School officials, DRRMCs are requested to render service even when classes are suspended

A. Contingency Plan 1. Situation 2. SWOT Analysis/ RISK Identification 3. Evacuation Plan 4. Coordinating Procedures Organization Work Plan July (National Disaster and Preparedness Month) Accomplishment Reports

Republic Act 10121 Executive Order No. 66,s.2012 DepEd Order No. 43, s. 2012 DepEd Order No. 26, s. 2012 DepEd Order No. 28, s. 2005 NDCC Memorandum No. 7, s. 2006

MANILA, Philippines The Senate is facing indecision on the proposal to move the opening of classes from June to September. This is after senators saw conflicting issues after representatives from the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration and the Department of Education laid down their arguments Tuesday on revising the school calendar. The Senate committees on Education, Arts and Culture joint with Ways and Mean, Finance, and Science and technology held the meeting with officials from Pagasa and DepEd. In an interview after the hearing, Senator Edgardo Angara, chairman of the committee on education, said that the Senate cannot make its decision on the matter as of yet since there are equally strong arguments on both sides. We are not prepared to make a decision, Angara told reporters in an interview, addeding the Senate will consult oth er stakeholders like the Commission on Higher Education, the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority and the business sector. Angara said they will also set another meeting to further discuss the matter. In an interview after the committee hearing, DepEd Secretary Armin Luistro said that they are open to studying proposals of rescheduling the opening of classes which coincides with the onset of storm and monsoon seasons. Classes in all levels are frequently suspended due to strong rains and floods, disrupting the countrys school calendar. But Luistro admitted that things do not bode well for the proposal after Pagasa revealed that it cannot guarantee that September will be storm-free in other parts of the country. There are areas wher you can start classes any month and will still experience the same problems, Luistro said. During the hearing, Falviana Hilario, acting deputy administrator for research and development, told the Senate committees that only the National Capital Region and provinces in the western section of the country will benefit from the rescheduling of classes. According to Hilario, the NCR and western provinces like Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, Bulacan Pampanga, Zambales, and Tarlac are provinces that experience Type 1 climate in the country, which is dry from November to April and have peak rainy seasons during June and July. Meanwhile, those experiencing Type 2 climate, specifically those in the eastern side of the country which has peak rainy seasons from October to January, will not benefit from the rescheduling of the opening of classes, Hilario said. She added that this is based on Pagasas 30-year data. Luistro added that parents in the countryside also oppose the opening of classes in September since this would mean children will still be in school during the months of April and May which is the harvest season for farming communities. It is customary for children to help out during the harvest season, Luistro said. He added that April and May are the peak months for cultural and religious traditions like family reunions and fiestas, and parents, particularly those coming from the provinces, fear that these traditions will be forgotten if classes will be held during the summer time. Luistro furthered that in the 70s, the opening of classes was also moved to September due to inclement weather but the same problems arose.

Read more: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/249811/proposed-september-opening-of-classes-facing-gloomy-prospects#ixzz2eXTXH9WE Follow us: @inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook MANILA, Philippines The Department of Education (DepEd) is open to the idea of moving the school opening to September to avoid frequent class suspensions forced by stormy weather. But Education Secretary Armin Luistro said there must be scientific data and consensus to back the change. At present, the school year starts sometime between June and July, which coincides with the onset of the rainy season, and ends sometime between March and April, the start of summer. A fresh proposal for the change came from Sen. Franklin Drilon last week following the suspension of classes in Metro Manila and surrounding provinces starting midweek as a result of the widespread flooding caused by incessant torrential monsoon rains. DepEd is open to the renewed proposal to move the opening of classes to September but would like to get from PAGASA more sol id data on weather patterns, Luistro said, referring to the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration. He said DepEd needed to know, among other things, the intensity of heat during summer and the strength and number of typhoon s from September to December. Luistro said wide consultations would be needed, as this will have wide-ranging effects on industry, the local governments schedule of fiestas, farming communities harvest season, Luistro said. Also, Luistro said, the DepEd, the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) and the Technological Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) must agree on a new school calendar. DepEd hopes schools in flooded areas will resume classes on Monday, and start within the week extra class sessions to make up for the canceled school days.

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