THE ALLIANCE of Concerned Teachers said that the classroom shortage was caused by dwindling funds.

“From the P39 billion budget for classroom construction in 2014, the funding peaked at P109 billion and about P85 billion in 2016 and 2017, respectively. However, it dwindled to a few billions since then. Data also shows the diminishing performance of the government in classroom construction vis-à-vis their set targets. Its best performance was in 2016, at almost 40,000 classrooms built, but it declined in the following years,” Vladimer Quetua, the group’s chairperson, said.

“There had been massive construction of classrooms from 2014 to 2017 given the heightened needs due to the addition of senior high school under the K-12 program, but the government seemed to have slackened off from 2018 while the shortages remained enormous,” Quetua added.

He said that his group worries about the fate of classroom construction as Vice President and Education Secretary Sara Duterte rejects the push for more funding and better performance in building classrooms.

“If the dwindling trend in classroom construction funding and performance continues instead of averted, we are in for worse scenarios in the next years,” Quetua said.

According to the group, allocating P100 billion or more to classroom construction in a year is not impossible.