ILOILO City – The Department of Education (DepEd) is facing challenges in hiring teaching and non-teaching personnel for Western Visayas.
For 2024, DepEd Region 6 created 2,151 new teaching positions, but as of October, only 1,535 or 71 percent of these have been filled, leaving 616 positions vacant.
Meanwhile, of the 768 newly created non-teaching positions, only 264 or 34 percent have been filled, with 508 positions still unfilled.
“It remains a challenge to fill available items. We still have many vacant positions,” said DepEd-6 director Dr. Ramir Uytico.
Negros Occidental and Iloilo Province are particularly affected by these vacancies.
In Negros Occidental, only 20 of the 305 teaching positions allocated for this year have been filled, representing just seven percent, with 285 positions remaining vacant.
In Iloilo Province, 516 teaching positions were opened, but only 305 or 59 percent have been filled, leaving 212 vacancies.
When asked about the reasons for the high number of unfilled positions, Schools Division Superintendent Dr. Ernesto Servillon Jr. of the Schools Division Office (SDO) – Iloilo Province explained that the limited number of human resource personnel has slowed down the hiring process.
“It is challenging in Iloilo Province because we have 42 municipalities and one city with 57 school districts, and our Human Resource personnel is the same in number as that of smaller divisions like Passi City or Iloilo City. However, we are implementing strategies to speed up the process by increasing the number of people assisting our HR team,” Servillon said.
He, however, did not say what those strategies were.
Servillon expressed optimism that they would catch up with the hiring of both teaching and non-teaching personnel by the fourth quarter of 2024.
He also noted that local government units (LGUs) are assisting SDO-Iloilo Province in hiring teachers through the School Education Fund.
“There is no sufficiency in the number of teachers because we cannot control the increasing population every year,” he added.
As of September 2024, DepEd-6 had a total of 78,223 teaching personnel in the region, and as of February 2024, there were 9,698 non-teaching staff.
Meanwhile here are the salary grades for teachers:
* Teacher 1 – Salary Grade 11 – P27,000
* Teacher 2 – Salary Grade 12 – P29,165
* Teacher 3 – Salary Grade 13 – P31,320
* Special Education Teacher 1 – Salary Grade 14 – P33,843
* Special Education Teacher 2 – Salary Grade 15 – P36,619
* Special Education Teacher 3 – Salary Grade 16 – P39,672
* Special Education Teacher 4 – Salary Grade 17 – 43,030
* Special Science Teacher 1 – Salary Grade 13 – P31,320
* Special Science Teacher 2 – Salary Grade 16 – P39,672
* Special Science Teacher 3 – Salary Grade 19 – P51,357
* Special Science Teacher 4 – Salary Grade 22 – P71,511
* Special Science Teacher 5 – Salary Grade 24 – P90,078
* Head Teacher 1 – Salary Grade 14 – P33,843
* Head Teacher 2 – Salary Grade 15 – P36,619
* Head Teacher 3 – Salary Grade 16 – P39,672
* Head Teacher 4 – Salary Grade 17 – P43,030
* Head Teacher 5 – Salary Grade 18 – P46,725
* Head Teacher 6 – Salary Grade 19 – P51,357
* Master Teacher 1 – Salary Grade 18 – P46,725
* Master Teacher 2 – Salary Grade 19 – P51,357
* Assistant School Principal 1 – Salary Grade 18 – P46,725
* Assistant School Principal 2 – Salary Grade 19 – P51,357
* School Principal 1 – Salary Grade 19 – P51,357
* School Principal 2 – Salary Grade 20 – P57,347
* School Principal 3 – Salary Grade 21 – P63,997
* School Principal 4 – Salary Grade 22 – P71,511/PN
