SENATOR PIA Cayetano on Monday lauded the Department of Education for the implementation of pilot face-to-face classes.

During the marathon hybrid session on the proposed 2022 budget of the DepEd and its attached agencies, Cayetano said she is proud that schools are finally welcoming students back to the classrooms after two years of distance learning.

She congratulated Education Secretary Leonor Briones and her team for “relentlessly pushing hard” President Rodrigo Duterte to acknowledge the importance of the resumption of classes for young learners.

“I wish for the success of the pilot implementation which just started. My fervent wish is that the pilot would be expanded,” Cayetano said.

“Children need to be in school. Our job is to make it as safe as possible and to be able to react depending on the situation,” she added.

She said the DepEd’s proposed budget for next year is P591.97 billion which is almost 4 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product with the ideal budget pegged at 4 percent of GDP.