The SM Foundation and SM Prime turned over on Dec. 18 a newly built two-story school building to Sta. Barbara Central Elementary School in Zamboanga City, which was heavily ravaged during the Zamboanga siege in 2013.
School principal Anna Liza Martin says that none of the three multi-story school buildings of Sta. Barbara Central School survived the attacks as all of them were rendered unusable after the siege.
As the campus fell under the control of the insurgents who barricaded themselves inside the classrooms, all school facilities were either completely demolished or considered dangerous to use for everyday classes.
Aside from the classrooms, Martin says that all their learners lost considerable school hours, added with the stress and pressure of having to relocate to neighboring schools just to catch up.
Hindered from proper learning
Head teacher Alice Yusop, who was present during the attacks, says that even when neighboring campuses have hosted their learners, the shortage of teachers and facilities in other schools in the surrounding communities hindered their learners from receiving quality education.
“Six of us teachers had to follow them there so that we can teach them because those schools can barely accommodate them and we did not want them to lose any more school days,” Yusop says.
But the Zamboanga siege not only affected the learners’ school days, but their mental well-being, as well, according to the teacher.
“I remember one specific instance when, in one of our makeshift classrooms in a host campus, there was an explosion, but it was just an electric fuse box. I remember how the learners ran scared and crying. That was the toll on them. It was not only about losing school days, but it was also about their mental health,” she says.
Martin recalls how the school’s recovery was a very hard and long process.
Going back to the campus after the month-long attacks, they found almost nothing to build from and the memories of the attacks scattered all around them.
“It took more than five years for us to rebuild Sta. Barbara Central School,” she says.
Nidznalyn Kasim, one of the parents of Sta. Barbara Central School’s pupils, shares how the siege has dampened the spirits of the learners and the whole community in the aftermath.
“We were scared. But as there was also almost nothing left after the siege, we had to face the fact that our learners, the children might not have anywhere else to go in the meantime. It was very hard,” Kasim says.
Fresh start, new hope
Now, more than a decade later, as the SMFI continues to help ease the educational challenges caused by the siege as it turns over the new building to the teachers and the learners of Sta. Barbara Central School.
SMFI executive director for education programs Carmen Linda Atayde, in her speech during the turnover ceremony, says that it is the 109th school building that was donated by the foundation to schools all over the country. This is the second school building built by the foundation in Zamboanga.
The four-classroom building is equipped with electric fans for proper ventilation, toilets, and washbasins inside the classrooms.
The SMFI also furnished the classrooms with 25 left-handed armchairs, which were made by the PWD community in Manila, as well as facilities that can cater PWD learners and teachers.
The new building also has a clinic, a mini library, and a room dedicated to the arts and music.
Sta. Barbara Central School caters to almost 3,000 enrollees, 99 percent of whom are Muslim learners from nearby Barangays Sta. Barbara, Rio Hondo, Marique, and Kasanyagan.
The new building from the SMFI will be utilized by Grade 2 and Kindergarten learners.
“The opening of this school building indeed showed the learners that we can have a new start, that there are still sponsors who are willing to help pave the way so that they can have a brighter future despite what happened in the past,” Kasim says.
Martin says that the project brought with it new hope for the future, erasing from memory the trauma and the struggles that came with the attacks.
“The building effectively blocks remnants of the siege and has transformed Sta. Barbara Central School. There is no fear anymore and no more worries,” she says.
Believing in the power of education in uplifting communities, SM Foundation has been an active member of DepEd’s Adopt-a-School Program since 2002, turning over more than 100 school buildings to grassroots communities nationwide. The said program intends to address overcrowding in schools and provide an environment conducive for learning.
