NOTE: This story was first published in The Bohol Chronicle’s Sunday print edition.

The COVID-19 pandemic has not only paralyzed the economy in the province but it has also taken a toll on the enrolment of both public and private schools.

The kindergarten to grade six in public schools in the province suffered the most with only 124,318 enrolees for schoolyear 2020-2021 (or 74.39%) as against 167,095 in 2019-2020, Gov. Arthur C. Yap said during the press conference on Friday a the new Capitol.

Some 42,777 students for these grades were not enrolled yet.

Compared to private schools, some 2,197 were enrolled for Kindergarten to Grade 6 for SY 2020-2021 as against the 8,541 enrolled during the SY 2019-2020. There are some 6,344 not yet enrolled, data from the Department of Education showed.

In public schools, there are some 63,706 grades, 7-10 enrollees, for 2020-2021 or only 70.57% lower than 90,272 in 2019-2020. There are 26,566 more not yet enrolled.

For grades 11-12, only 26,566 or 95% were enlisted for 2020-2021 if compared to 29,887 in 2019-2020. Only 1,321 not yet enrolled.

In private schools, some 10,805 (49.88%) were enrolled in Grades 7-10 for 2020-2021 lower than 21,663 in 2019-2020. A total of 10,858 have not been enrolled yet.

Grades 11-12’s enrollees for 2020-2021 posted a total of 3,761 as against the10,252 in 2019-2020. There are 6,491 not yet enlisted.

Gov. Yap said that this “significant” drop and this means “hundreds of thousands will not go to school.”

The figures were presented by DepEd during the meeting with the municipal mayors last week, he said.

“The governor said this is something that we have to take note of, because, possibly this school year, hundreds of thousands of Bol-anon children will not go to school. If they are not going to school, the province needs to offer alternative means to bring the educational materials to their homes.” (rvo)