The provincial government here is targeting to spend around PHP500 million from the special education fund (SEF) for classroom projects.

In an interview, Iloilo Governor Arthur Defensor Jr. said the fund is on top of the national allocation that will be downloaded to local government units (LGUs) under the classroom acceleration initiative of the Department of Education.

He said that last December, the province released PHP125 million worth of checks to LGUs and secondary schools for the implementation of around 66 projects.

“We have been releasing more than that since January,” he said at the sidelines of the turnover of career guidance instructional modules (CGIM) to 80 public secondary schools across Iloilo province on Friday in Pavia, Iloilo.

The governor said he will be signing the amended version of the Bulig Eskwela Sang Probinsya (BESProbins) Program, which will include the plan to address the classroom backlog, which currently stands at 1,655, with 468 being makeshift classrooms.

“We know what number to chase,” he said.

Defensor also joined President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and other national and local officials in the signing of a memorandum of agreement (MOA) between the Department of Education (DepEd) and LGUs to accelerate the construction of classrooms nationwide.

The governor expressed his gratitude for the confidence given by President Marcos to allow LGUs to implement the classroom program of the national government.

“For us, it is easy, and we will hit the ground running because we have been constructing classrooms together with our LGUs,” he said, underscoring that since 2020, the classrooms that were inaugurated were implemented by barangays and municipalities.

“We are very familiar with that already, and we are happy to engage. They (barangays and municipalities) have been doing a very good job in constructing our classrooms.”

He said there was no amount announced, but he would be happy for any amount that would be given by the national government. (PNA)