PUBLIC schools and teachers can look forward to sufficient funding for their various needs should former Senator and 2025 senatorial candidate Panfilo Lacson return to the Senate in May.

Lacson said he would push to increase appropriations for programs such as school nutrition and teachers’ allowances in the national budget—just as he consistently did during his time in the Senate.

“When I was in the Senate, I would augment their funding during budget deliberations—consistently, every year,” he said.

This includes the augmentation of teacher allowances, the school feeding program, and chalk allowances before Senator Ramon Bong Revilla Jr. authored a law to institutionalize the chalk allowance.

Lacson added that if such increases cannot be done through legislation, they can still be achieved via the General Appropriations Act or the national budget.

“I did that every year through institutional amendments, where we secured added appropriations for nutrition, school feeding, and teacher allowances,” he explained.

Lacson had introduced amendments to the national budget over several years to boost funding for education-related programs, including the Quick Response Fund; Indigenous People’s Education Program; Flexible Learning Options; Special Education Program; Inclusive Education Program; Child Protection Program; Last Mile Schools Program; UP Diliman Institute of Marine Science; UPLB National Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology’s R&D; Continuing Education–Teacher Quality and Development Program; Textbooks and Instructional Materials; and the Computerization Program.