By NITZ ARANCON and SHIELA MAE BUTLIG Correspondents THE education department is seeking over P400 billion for the K-to-12 program aimed at improving the quality of education in the country next year, Education Secretary Armin Luistro said yesterday. Luistro, who was here for the Mindanao-wide K-to-12 summit, said the budget for the program needs to be increased from this year’s P365 billion. He said the national government can afford the proposed budget increase. The Department of Education (Deped) also plans to construct over six thousand classrooms across Mindanao next year as part of the K-12 program. He said the Deped would also hire 10 thousand teachers when the program goes full swing next year. “We do not want people in  Mindanao to be left behind,” Luistro said. The goal, he said, is to build one or two senior high school buildings in every town or barangay that would produce 265 thousand graduates Mindanao two years from now. Luistro said local governments would play a very important role in making the Deped program successful. He cited the case of Cagayan de Oro where over 300 classrooms were built in the last 20 months. Luistro said it shows that the local government is making use of its Special Education  Fund  well. Luistro said the government used to spend P8,800 a year for every student. Now, the budget is P17,300 for each student. The Deped, he said, was also successful in bring many school dropouts back to school. From 11.7 percent in 2008 or some 2.9 million,  this was reduced to 5.2 percent in 2013. Luistro said there was a need to identify and report children who are not in school so the government could intervene.