THE ALLIANCE of Concerned Teachers on Monday slammed the Department of Education for forcing teachers to report to their respective schools on days without election-related duties or activities.

ACT lamented that DepEd is “losing its grip” on teachers’ job description which is to teach students.

“It is beyond ridiculous to force teachers without election duties to report on-site while schools are being prepared to serve as voting centers for the May 9 polls,” the group said in a statement.

“Even DepEd’s own school calendar marked the period from May 2–13 as non-school days, and therefore should also not be considered as workdays for teachers,” it added.

DepEd earlier announced the suspension of classes in all levels in public schools from May 2 to 13 due to activities related to the elections.

ACT said the memorandum which requires teachers to report physically despite class suspensions adds to the “string of senseless and unnecessarily burdensome work orders” issued by DepEd.

“Just today, most NCR teachers were required to report on-site despite only a few number of schools being allowed to participate in DepEd’s program for limited face-to-face classes – which effectively made online teaching even more difficult due to the lack of school infrastructure for such,” it pointed out.

“Of course, we can’t forget how teachers were made to render services months before classes were allowed to resume in 2020, then denied up to this day due compensation for the extended 77 work days for that particular school year,” it added.