Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao have been hit by earthquakes recently. Across the major islands, it was the masses who suffered, their small sari-sari stores wrecked, their vulnerable homes threatened to collapse as it wiggled from the tremors, and their children who had to cower in fear.
Most of us did not get to have an engineer and architect oversee the construction of our houses, so when earthquakes hit, the looming of the darkest what ifs pop out. What if our house gets destroyed, where will I go, will I be able to continue my studies, will I have to find a job instead to support my family and drop out of school? These questions are the type of concerns most students want to avoid but they are the questions we must ponder on with effort at some point in our lives, the hard questions we must answer, as one of the many who weren’t born into a wealthy family.
Again, who suffers?
With education being one of the few avenues to escape the ever pervasive cycle of hardships and poverty, these natural disasters end the hopes and dreams of many. They stomp on the hard-working breadwinners earning and struggling to drag their family to a better situation. As disasters strike, it is not only the structures that are at risk but the many futures of the country’s students.
While money intended to build better classrooms are sliced and diced, somewhere out there an over-flowing classroom filled with noisy children are put at risk as they must remain inside that cramped and smelly room, barely a classroom. What happens then when an earthquake tests the under-funded schools structure?
Who suffers? Definitely not the wealthy and corrupt.