Calls for academic freeze rejected by DepEd

On Wednesday, Education Undersecretary Nepomuceno Malaluan dismissed calls for academic freeze, saying it is a shortsighted solution that could affect the entire educational system.

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Malaluan said that the call for academic freeze was an unpopular position considering that over 24 million students have enrolled for the coming school year, where they will learn through distance learning modalities.

We would like to dismiss this call as not something that is supported by the direction of DepEd for learning continuity. This position is shortsighted as it does not take into consideration the trade-off of prolonged interruption,

he said.

Earlier, a private school group also rejected calls for academic freeze, saying its effects are serious and compounding such as learning loss.

The hashtag #AcademicFreezeNOW has been trending on Twitter Philippines since netizens share their frustrations on online learning and other distance learning modalities.

A user with the handle The Ruins addressed a petition on Change.org to the DepEd to halt the start of the school year "until the digital divide is fully resolved or results of mass testing and curve-flattening are already evaluated empirically."

The user argued that not everybody has the means to adapt to the new normal type of schooling and online learning is proven to be ineffective and insufficient.

As of Wednesday, the petition has gathered 233,000 signatories out of its 300,000 target signatures.

Malaluan called the proposal ill-informed as he reiterated that online classes would not be the sole distance learning modality to be implemented, contrary to arguments of the proponents.

Meanwhile, Education Secretary Leonor Briones said distance learning dry runs are underway in schools to ensure a smooth start to the school year on October 5.

It's not as if biglaan na lang tayo magbukas ng ating mga eskuwelahan by October 5, dahil, more or less, alam na natin kung ano ang mga challenges at atin na itong tinugunan, 

she said.

["It's not as if we will suddenly open our schools by October 5, because, more or less, we already know what the challenges are and we'd have addressed them by then," he said.]