http://www.LivingInthePhilippines.comis theORIGINAL, firstPhilippines Expat site on the Net, since 1989. This is not one of many knock-offs, copycats, imitations. Some have permutations of the names,misspellings and "in" and "the" or "ing." left off to deceive you. This is the original, by: Don A. Herrington
Heritage
Movement Restores Schoolhouses Nationwide (By Augusto F. Villalon )
Heritage
Movement Restores Schoolhouses Nationwide
A pioneering partnership by
the Department of Education (DepEd) and the Heritage
Conservation Society (HCS) has been implementing the
Heritage School Building Restoration Program.
Originally conceptualized by former Education
Secretary Armand Fabella and later by his successor,
Brother Andrew Gonzalez, the program is now being
put into motion by Education Secretary Edilberto de
Jesus and Undersecretary Juan Miguel Luz.
DepEd and HCS will identify and restore one heritage
schoolhouse in each region of the country. HCS will
then organize a consulting team to provide the
restoration and technical expertise and oversee the
restoration together with DepEd engineers.
The first to be completed is the historic Rizal
Elementary School in Bacolod. The renovated
structure was inaugurated last Saturday, June 19,
the birthday of the national hero Jose Rizal.
The program restored the Rizal Elementary School
building to as close as it could get to the original
state. Set back from the street by an elegant
tree-shaded plaza, the two-story building was
typical of those constructed during the era.
However, insensitive remodeling over the years
altered the interior of the 1907 building. Finally
it was abandoned and left to deteriorate.
Its original construction of wood supported by a
concrete base survives. A verandah wraps around the
ground floor and an old acacia tree shades its open
second story.
Large sliding kapis windows above ventanillas that
reach to the floor open up large sections of wall to
the outdoors. To maximize the interior airflow,
interior partitions have rows of pierced wooden
fretwork (calado) panels that meet the high ceiling,
allowing air to freely circulate within the
building.
Its high-pitched, galvanized-iron roofing sweeps way
past windows and walls with a generous overhang that
shades the building and keeps rain away.
Attuned to the tropics, the building is breezy and
cool. Being inside the restored building today
proves that old-style tropical architecture is still
the best for our climate. Mature shade trees cool
the breeze that once again flows through the large
windows.
The restored building shows that instead of being
rendered obsolete, old structures can still be
recycled for modern academic uses. The ground floor
of the newly restored building will house a
state-of-the art computer laboratory, a music room,
and administrative offices. The first-rate library
that Rizal Elementary School deserves will occupy
the entire second floor.
The rationale behind the program is to make history
come alive for teachers and students by recycling
historic structures not as ivory-tower museums but
as classrooms and laboratories for everyday use. The
program projects heritage as touching all aspects of
daily life, not as an irrelevant, elitist notion as
the common misconception has it.
Now that teachers and students will once again use
the heritage building, the history of the Rizal
Elementary School and the DepEd comes back to life,
making the public aware of the heritage of the
school and of the DepEd's legacy of nation-building
through literacy.
Originally founded in 1901 as the Instituto de Rizal,
the school was renamed the Rizal Institute in 1903
when the American Thomasite teachers arrived in
Bacolod. When it transferred to the present building
in 1907, it became Bacolod High School until 1924,
when it changed name to the Occidental Negros High
School.
It was converted into Bacolod West Elementary School
in 1932, and was renamed Rizal Elementary School in
1959.
The tradition of mass education in the Philippines
started in 1901 when 1,074 American teachers sailed
to our shores aboard the transport ships Thomas and
Sheridan. Since the majority of them arrived on the
Thomas, they were called the Thomasites.
The Thomasites quickly fanned all over the country,
setting up schools in far-flung localities where no
school facilities existed.
Representative Isauro Gabaldon authored Act 1801 of
the National Assembly, which allocated P1 million
for the construction of elementary schools all over
the country. The buildings are generically called
Gabaldon Schoolhouses.
Yale graduate William Parsons, the consulting
architect of the Bureau of Public Works from
1905-1914, prepared a set of standard designs for
one-story buildings that were slightly elevated
above ground, with classrooms along one side of an
open gallery. Nipa roofs recalled the bahay kubo and
so did the swing-out windows with kapis panels.
To celebrate the DepEd's century of existence, the
program will restore different types of school
buildings typical of the American colonial era when
the public-education program in the Philippines was
a high government priority.
Scheduled for completion in October is Baguio
Central School.
Heritage studies are not formally offered in most
universities. To introduce heritage to the
university curriculum, the HCS is coordinating teams
of history, engineering and architecture students
from Manila and Baguio universities to document the
heritage structures in Teachers Camp in Baguio.
The student involvement will lead to the preparation
of architectural plans by conservation professionals
for most of the Teachers Camp structures.
By restoring classrooms, the DepEd drives home the
lesson that patrimony lives and continues to be
relevant to our lives. Classes in heritage
classrooms provide experiential learning on
patrimony with a stronger impact than textbook
instruction.
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