Every time there’s a place in the country hit by a typhoon, a landslide, or an earthquake, a common post-calamity sight is school children having classes under a tree exposed to elements.
That situation would be minimized, if not completely eliminated, if the Department of Education’s new school building design would be built according to specifications.
VERA Files trustee and writer Yvonne Chua reported that DepEd will be building this year 30,000 calamity-resilient classrooms costing 60 per cent more than the ordinary classroom. Example: a complete one-story one-classroom building with basic features that is not calamity-resilient would cost P685, 000. The new, stronger design costs P1.1 million.
Chua said “To make each building more resilient to earthquakes, the DepEd is banking on a bigger footing or base and thicker beams and columns. It now requires a tie beam even for a single-story school. The horizontal beam connects several columns to make the structure stable.”
The DepEd’s answer to strong typhoons is a combination of steel truss roofing, roof framing support that uses J-bolts, thicker roofing sheets and ridge roll, thicker and more reinforcing bars or rebars for roof beams, and a drop ceiling.”
Chua further said: “The basic features include concrete and smooth finish flooring, smooth plastered walls, painted walls and ceiling, a complete set of windows, two entrances with doors for each classroom, complete electrical wires and fixtures, built-in curved chalkboard, ramps that comply with the Accessibility Law and toilets.”
The new design can withstand deadly earthquakes and storm winds of up to 250 kph, more ferocious than those unleashed by supertyphoon “Yolanda” in November, according to Dep Ed.
There are two sources of fund for the new schoolbuildings: the Basic Educational Facilities Fund (BEFF) provided in the national budget and the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp.
Pagcor-funded schoolbuildings will cost more because “They will be fitted with special features such as a pediment façade, stage, concrete parapet, decorative balcony railings and wider corridors.”
Chua said the differences between the old school-building design are structural and will not be visible to those untrained to building construction. That’s why there’s again the danger that shortcuts would be made by unscrupulous persons, just what happened in many cases in the past.
Annabelle Pangan, who heads the DepEd’s Physicial Facilities and Schools Engineering Division that developed the new design in coordination with the DPW, expressed that concern saying ““(T)hese improvements will be meaningless if we cannot implement (or) execute the design as planned.”
She is being realistic. In our visit to Guiuan, Samar last February, we noticed that although all the buildings were destroyed, public offices like City Hall, schools, health centers and barangay halls fared worse that privately- owned buildings and residences.
One can guess how much of the money released for the project were actually spent in the construction of the buildings and how much went to the pockets of greedy politicians and their cohorts.
Pangan stressed the importance of monitoring not only by government auditors but also by civil society.
To better watch the construction of the newly designed calamity-resilient school buildings, the DepEd is hiring 44 more engineers to augment its current pool of 175 engineers deployed nationwide, Pangan said. The DPWH has also hired 120 cadet engineers for the BEFF-supported projects.
Together with school heads, the engineers will be oriented on construction monitoring using materials developed by, among others, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (a simplified construction handbook) and the Australian government (an instructional video on classroom construction).
There are civil society groups like The Ateneo School of Government, who has taken up the advocacy of monitoring schoolbuilding construction.
It should be every citizen’s concern. A vigilant citizenry is the best antidote to misuse and abuse of authority.
P1.1M for a classroom is ridiculously expensive. Go ask an architect, a developer, or contractor. Expat (high end)houses currently begin at about P25K/sqm. But that includes high end bathroom and kitchen fixtures, granite kitchen tops with high end cabinetry, tiled floorings and heavy-gauge window casing and doors. Among others.
I don’t see that at P1.1M, a 40sqm (5x8m) classroom’s cost with mere structural upgrades could even come close.
kotong is the name of the game. Most government officials do not want to give an honest service to the people who pay taxes for their salaries and as long as they can scoop more palusot from their tray of lies they will never stop their rotten mind-set.
kawawa talaga si juan!
Ellen, here is one Novel approach or idea is procuring assets and could be applicable in the Phl.. We call it P3s or Public Private Partnerships where assets is procured on a Design-build – finance -maintain contract by the Private PartnersAnd all the risks on delays, defects are assumed by the Partners thereby absolving the Taxpayers from any extra cost.. Payments for the assets is usually spread over the expected life or over the long terms or at the delivery of assets at guaranteed specs. For reference on this scheme you may check its one of its first projects.. The 12 kms Confederation Bridge connecting Prince Edward Island to Mainland. The bridge was completed in 1996 and will revert back to the govt in 2032 when the obligation to the Private partners who built the Bridge is all paid up by the tolls and yearly payments equal to the subsidy to the RoRo..
And the other Biggie is the Humber River Regional Hospital. Right in downtown toronto, North America first Fully digitallized Hospital.. It will be completed on schedule by October and is designed built financed will be maintained and operated by Private Partners and will be Paid by the Govt for 32 years… It is somewhere I’m the 1 billion contract.. It is the same with Schools Constructions but with Schools it has to be Standardized so as not to Discrimate students in a low income neighbourhood from the well to do Neighbours .. Capital donation for School Infras are not ALLOWED as it will offset the equality of facilities..
Vic, Is that similar to BOT? Build Operate Transfer.
A pivate firm builds a public facility say, airport terminal, using its own funds, it operates the facility to recover its investments, then after the agreed period of time, which by then it would have recovered and made profits out of its investments, it turns over the facility to the government.
No, Ellen, it is a bundled contract mostly, that will include the reasonable profit for the investors which is usually the Capital market, (Canada Pension, the Teachers* fund and mutual funds, which risks their money to finance the Project in a long term basis)The Government it this case is not making a Big outlay in one payment but can raise the funds in a long term with the Tax Provision…Like we did with our Power Generation..the Government invested $35 billions unfunded and Charged us .7 cent per kW to retire that Debt for 35 years and will be paid up in 2017…(average $4 per household/month and also it also applied its income tax and “profit” from operation to Debt retirement..which is close to $1 billion a year average..
*the Teacher is the pension fund of Ontario Teachers that is soo Big that it invest in many Capital Long Term investments..the Teachers has 180 thous. active members still teaching, 127 thousands pensioners and 69 thousands other members and has investment of $140 billions)
In case of our Electric Generation unfunded Debt which was Financed by the Capital Market,the interest and principal payment was just too Big that the Government will be shying away from that Huge unfunded Scheme and will go to the P3s and will pay it out from the Budget instead of Charging the Taxpayers in form of User Fees…we just decided not to have Tolls roads other than the Electronic Express way that the Government leased to the Concessioners for 99 years to operate for 3 billions..this is the opposite of BOT..the Govt built the roadways and wanted the Cash, leased the 70 kms to the private operators on conditions that it will expand the Toll road to 107 kms and extra lanes each way and without Gates same as Regular Highway and bill the customers by Electronically and it works except the out of Province which are exempt..their car registration can not be accessed..and who knows who financed the operators which are Spanish and Australians? Canada Pension Board,, our own pension fund, which also invest in everything..