GIVE MORE INCENTIVES TO PUBLIC SCHOOL
STUDENTS FROM HINTERLANDS -ANGARA

Senator Juan Edgardo "Sonny" Angara has appealed to the government to provide more incentives to public school students from the hinterlands to encourage them to finish school and reduce the high dropout rate.

Angara said despite the free education in public schools, there are other challenges that prevent these students from going to school on a regular basis.

Most of these students, he said, come from the poorest of the poor communities which are usually located in isolated islands or mountainous areas.

"The Department of Education, in cooperation with the the local governments, should identify the areas with high dropout rates and find out what has been causing such problem," the neophyte senator said.

Angara, who was chair of the House of Representatives' Committee on Higher and Technical Education when he was a congressman, said he will propose an increase in the budget of the department for such an undertaking and urged the local governments concerned to also provide their share in giving incentives to these school children.

He pointed out that many of these students often have to trek long distances to reach their schools. Others have to cross rivers that are dangerous, especially during bad weather or with bamboo rafts floating downstream. Still others have to walk barefooted for several hours and on an empty stomach because they have no food at home.

"These factors are forcing students to stop from going to school," Angara exclaimed.

"Because of their difficult situation, most of these children and their parents feel that they need not finish school once they have learned how to read and write or when they think they have studied enough," he added.