House leader seeks inquiry into possibility of

assigning one nurse for every public school

A House leader is seeking an inquiry into the possibility of appointing one nurse for every
public school to provide accessible health care to some 17 million students enrolled in public
schools nationwide and provide jobs to some of the 221, unemployed nurses in the country!
"eputy #peaker $arlos %adilla sought the inquiry through House &esolution 12'( which
directs the House $ommittee on )asic *ducation to look into the possibility of employing one
school nurse for every public school in the country!
+Assigning a nurse to every public school in the country will be a step towards providing
accessible health care to our children and will offer opportunities for gainful employment to our
nurses,, said %adilla, representative of the -one "istrict of .ueva /i0caya!
$iting data from the "epartment of -abor and *mployment, %adilla said the number of
.ursing )oard *1am passers from 21 to 211 was about 221, with only about 2,
nurses employed here and abroad!
+3his therefore brings to 221, the number of unemployed nurses in the country,, he
said!
4eanwhile, %adilla said the %hilippine #tatistics Agency stated there are about 17 million
students enrolled in public schools all over the country during the school year 211 to 212!
%adilla said under the 21( &ationali0ation %rogram of the "epartment of *ducation
5"ep*d6, certain measures were instituted +in light of long7term reforms needed in the education
sector notwithstanding fast7changing demands of the local and global environment!,
He said %hase 1 of the said rationali0ation program includes the mandate, functions and
proposed organi0ational structures for the agency while %hase 11 includes the placement of
employees into the new staffing pattern!
%ursuant to the "ep*d &ationali0ation %rogram, %adilla said the "epartment of )udget
and 4anagement 5")46 approved a new staffing pattern for #chools "ivision 8ffices, which
includes .urse 11 with #alary 9rade 1:, under the #chool Health and .utrition $ategory!
+3he approved staffing pattern issued by the ")4 provides only a certain number of
.urse 11 items to each #chool "ivision classification, namely; /ery -arge #chools "ivision, 11
positions< -arge #chool "ivision, seven position< 4edium #chools "ivision, one or two
positions< and #mall #chools "ivision, one or none,, said %adilla!
%adilla said in the =ue0on $ity #chools "ivision, for e1ample, from the original 1( items
for %ublic Health .urse before the approved &ationali0ation %rogram, si1 items were abolished,
reducing the number of .urse 11 items to only seven! 5(6 rbb
NR # 3561
AUG 17, 2014