CAGAYAN de Oro City 2nd District Rep. Rufus Rodriguez on Tuesday filed a bill in Congress which seeks to cut the working hours of public school teachers from eight to six a day.
Rodriguez even said that House House Bill No. 7822 proposes shorter working hours for government teachers.
The bill according to Rodriguez stated that their present work schedule has left them stressed out and exhausted much to the detriment of our students.
“This bill is to seek to limit the class hours of public school teachers from eight (8) hours to six hours,” said Rodriguez.
Earlier, Teachers’ groups also called on the Department of Education (DepEd) to issue a “clear-cut policy” on the implementation of working hours after teachers were reportedly forced to render more than the required six hours of teaching due to a shortage of personnel.
According to the Teachers’ Dignity Coalition (TDC), the insufficient number of teaching personnel had prompted schools to either resort to bigger class sizes, which led to overcrowding in classrooms, or longer working hours for teachers.
“The bill aims to promote the welfare of public school teachers and to raise the quality of basic education in the Philippines,” said Rodriguez.
He noted the need to modify the teachers’ class hours to allow them to prepare lesson plans and instructional materials, interact with students during co-curricular activities, and perform other jobs that may be assigned by the principal or superior.
“Their work site is not limited to the classroom,” he said adding that teachers perform a regular eight-hour work shift just like any average laborer.
"Six hours of that shift may be spent in the lecture hall, and two hours are spent in lesson-plan preparation, lecture planning, and student-parent consultations,” Rodriguez explained.
He also commented on the outstanding innovative programs implemented by Vice President and DepEd Secretary Sara Duterte in her first year in office.
She has always been a true advocate of quality education for learners and in promoting the overall welfare of the teachers. We are confident that have her support on this measure,” Rodriguez added.
Data from the Department of Education shows that there are 876,642 public school teachers in basic education.
With a little over 28 million students enrolled in SY 2021-2022, the national teacher-to-learner ratio for elementary is 1:20; 1:24 in junior high school; and 1:26 in senior high school.
