THE COMMISSION on Higher Education appealed to President Duterte to open physical classes for three more courses.

“Ang aming hiling, Mr. President, baka puwedeng i-expand na natin ito sa ibang programa na kailangan din talaga ng face-to-face,” CHED Chairman Prospero de Vera III said.

The three courses, according to De Vera, are engineering, human resource management, and maritime programs.

The CHED chairman added the Inter-Agency Task Force already endorsed the proposal to the Chief Executive three weeks ago.

He said 13,188 students enrolled in medicine and allied health courses at 118 schools around the country are currently allowed to hold restricted in-person classes.

Nearly 10,000 students had already been vaccinated, according to De Vera, with only 41 of those who attended in-person classes getting infected with Covid19.

Those infected only exhibited moderate symptoms, the CHED chairman noted.

De Vera also stated around 1,048 faculty members are authorized to teach in person, including 1,003 of them having been immunized.

Fifteen of the educators who gave in-person lectures contracted mild Covid19 symptoms.