THE DEPARTMENT of Education has disclosed that more private schools will suspend their operations this school year because of the economic effects of Covid19.

“Based on the current figures that we have on the report of the field offices, we now have 865, of which, 43 percent are due to low enrollment and Covid-related cases,” Education Undersecretary Jesus Mateo said.

Previously, the education department reported that some 748 private schools would stop their operations before the academic year started because of very low enrollment turnout.

Based on the DepEd’s data, some two million students have enrolled in private schools, which is 47.14 percent lower from last year’s 4.3 million.

Around 24 million students have enrolled this year, 22.2 million of them in public schools.