It is common practice in school to excuse students from classes. This happens when a coach or a trainer in consultation with the principal feels the need to pull out the students for training in preparation for competition or for a big event from the inside or outside of school. Or in the case of sports training, the Department of Education Region III mandated every public elementary and high school to have its athletes undergo live-in training for around two weeks before the actual regional sports competition. During these periods, students are exclusively doing sports far from the hassle and bustle of classroom routine. However, the duration of students’ non- contact-inside-the-classroom activities or the allowance of live-in training for athletes is accompanied by two provisions as safety nets in order for  student-athletes not to be  shortchanged  in their right to gain quality academic education.

The Department of Education Regional Memorandum No. 13 Series of 2000 states that:

1. That athletes be selected not only on the basis of their athletic prowess
     but also taking into consideration their ability to catch up with missed
     lessons. Athletes with below average academic performance should no
    longer  be selected for higher level sports competition.

 

2. Special assistance should be given to pupils/ students who are
     representing their schools during sports competitions by giving them
     advanced lessons, special tests, self-learning modules, and the like to
     help them catch up with their lessons.

 

The idea that the student-athletes must not be shortchanged in getting quality instruction at par with others who are staying a hundred percent during class hours is paramount in the consideration of the Department of Education (DepEd). The extracurricular activities should never be a hindrance; instead, it should enrich students towards achieving greater academic performance. To protect further the students from being overly exploited outside regular academic responsibilities, the DepEd specifies the minimum contact days of teachers to students inside the classroom which is around 180 days out of a more than 200 days of school in a year.

So what if a student is pulled out from the class when there is a way to get them learned their lessons?

The problem lies when a teacher or a trainer excuses the students with IMPUNITY; when a student can no longer complete a week in a class without being called outside; when the administration approves of anything and everything place on its table without even scrutinizing whether the activities can be too much to disrupt the normal delivery of instruction; when the administration allows arbitrarily the grade retention rule for excused students which lead to abuse, wittingly or unwittingly, by both students and teachers.

A case in point is the students from the Special Program in the Arts. Since these specific SPA groups either major in dance, in theater or in music, they are the most victimized by the scheme of excuses engineered by teachers or trainers in their majors just to suit with their schedules of training whenever there are programs or competitions, effectively depriving these poor group of students of not just days, not weeks, but maybe even more than half of their school sessions in a year. Impossible! What one must do is observe to see how it happens. These abusive teachers even use the excuse to satisfy their classes at the expense of another. They think it is perfectly ok to sabotage classes  for their own classes’ sake.          

            You will be surprised if you are one of those teachers of SPA classes with the volume of excuse letters signed by their trainers laid on the table right before your eyes .And more surprised you will be when you learned that the students that you are supposed to excuse from the class based on the letter of whatever purpose, had been already out and had been arbitrarily taken away from your responsibility and authority.  Upon scrutiny, you will notice the letters are duly signed and approved by the school principal and on further scrutiny, you will discover that not all objectives of the pullout from classes are not as legitimate as the trainer-teachers want them to be. Some excuses require weeks or even almost a month for students to be out from classes; some, days only, but the common denominator is they happen every so often. Sure, the school has won accolades due to performances of these students. But is that all that matters? The students’ academic performance severely suffers as a consequence and the unfortunate thing is: that some of the teacher-trainers of these students demand the academic teachers to give these poor students grades they don’t deserve using the ambiguous and unsupported grade retention rule. The abusers do not stop with students, they bully their co-workers to pay for their transgression to students whose time to attend academic classes these abusers regularly violate.

How on earth has the school allowed the abuse to pervade?

 What are legit excuses? Contests are legitimate whether done outside or inside the school as long as they don’t come too often for the same persons or the same groups that they impair students from getting normal classroom instruction. Events or celebrations may also call the shots as these do not happen very often. Which are not? Curiously, it is not the big events that pave the way for chronic non-attendance, but the endless practice, practice and practice ranging from dancing, singing, acting or whatever that comes to their teacher’s mind without due consideration of whether the act violates the constitutional right of the student to quality education or the obligation of the school in dispensing education as stipulated in the Republic Act 9155 known as Governance in Basic Education Act of 2001 which states that:

“Schools shall have a single aim of providing the best possible basic education for all learners.”

            In view of the above, those who facilitate the wanton disruption of normal classroom sessions or those who pull out students with impunity causing  students to be deprived of normal class hours  should be liable to the law.

Extracurricular is good but not to the point that it will impede their academic development. When a student, especially those in the program in the arts, attends only less than half of his total academic sessions in a year due to dance or theater training or whatever that is, and that the excuse happens at  random without legitimate reason, then something is  wrong. Or when half of the class fail to attend even half of their academic sessions in a year, then this is far worse. But if the whole class suddenly is not around for practice for days due to an arbitrary excuse, then this is not just worst, it is simply evil.

What are the ramifications if the supposed to be harmless excuse from class becomes an abuse?

1.  The students’ concept of learning is corrupted. They think it is ok or normal not to attend classes. They can have grades anyway even if they haven’t learned anything.

            2. The students are deprived of their right to education.

3. The single most important objective of the school which is to provide the best possible basic education to learners failed.

The K to 12 basic education curriculum is new, so naturally it is fraught with mistakes and missteps on the part of policymakers and teachers as we grapple into experience and age. It is time that together with discovering and maneuvering towards a better practice and service, we who live and breathe in the system, should expel the old defeatist practices that tend to derail our purpose of giving best education to our ward as we march with the new age.

Speaking of new beginning, don’t we think now is the moment?  

By: Luz H. Buensuceso Teacher III-BNHS