Iloilo Governor Arthur Defensor Sr. has vowed to build more classrooms for the school children who mostly belong to the Panay Bukidnon Tribe in Alimodian town, a fourth class municipality with 51 barangays and is some 25 kilometers away from Iloilo city.
Alimodian Mayor Juanito T. Alipao, who is in the office of the governor Thursday, said that he is following up the support of the governor, who has pledged to give P2 million as the provincial government counterpart for the construction of additional classrooms in the four local government unit (LGU) initiated high schools.
Mayor Alipao also said that aside from the P2 million intended for the classroom construction, the governor is giving them additional P1 million as cash prize for Alimodian that received the Galing Pook award in Malacanang last Jan. 30 for being one of the top 10 outstanding LGUs in the country for its initiated program that is the establishment of the high schools.
The mayor recalled that it was in 2005 when he initiated the establishment of the Adriano Cabardo National High School in Cabanacan Proper, an upper barangay in Alimodian that is about 18 kilometers from the town proper. He said that he believes that education is a basic right of the child, but because of the distance of the barangay into the town proper where the Alimodian Comprehensive National High School (ACNHS) is located only a few children are able to attend school.
He said that the Cabanacan Proper belongs to the so-called “Seven Cities of Alimodian” or seven upper barangays of the town that every school year a family could only afford to send one child to school considering the expense that they have to shoulder. “For the tricycle fare only, the parents of a school child spends an average of P2,000 per week to get him to school,” Mayor Alipao said.
With the establishment of the school in Cabanacan Proper, the parents are now can afford to send their children to school. A family in Cabanacan Proper and in the six other neighboring barangays has an average of three children now in school.
He said that the first graduation of the school in Cabanacan Proper was in 2008 with 66 graduates.