More than 5K junior high, high school students go back to school

Roughly 5,072 students attended their first day of classes for school year 2015-2016 yesterday, according to principals of public middle schools and high schools in the Commonwealth.

Education Commissioner Dr. Rita Sablan told Saipan Tribune, though, that the numbers are expected to grow in the next few weeks.

“We’ll probably have bigger numbers in the upcoming weeks for the middle and junior high student enrollment. With Typhoon Soudelor, there are probably still some that haven’t registered or have yet to attend school. So the numbers will increase,” Sablan said, while doing an assessment yesterday morning at Kagman High School.

Public School System Education Commissioner Dr. Rita Sablan, left, is accompanied by one staff of Chacha Oceanview Junior High School yesterday morning, as part of her assessment on the first day of schools if all operations were running smoothly. (Jayson Camacho)

She noted that all three public high schools—Kagman, Marianas, and Saipan Southern high schools—as well as all five middle schools—San Antonio, Tanapag, Dandan, Hopwood, and Chacha Oceanview—are now all open.

“Because of the difficulties from Typhoon Soudelor and the power and water is not in full operation, all of the schools that are open now will be open for half day,” Sablan said.

Classes in middle and high schools start at 8am and end at 12pm.

Public School System principals and other school administrators interviewed said the first day of classes ran smoothly.

By the numbers

Of the 5,000-plus students so far, MHS has the largest number of students as of yesterday with 1,530.

MHS principal Cherlyn Cabrera said 435 of these students are freshmen.

KHS principal Leila Staffler reported a total of 640 students, with a little over 200 freshmen. SSHS associate school leader Jonathan Aguon said they have a total of 933 students.

“There were new enrollees this morning so the numbers went up,” Aguon said.

SSHS principal Martha Kintol said they have about 270 freshmen so far.

Among middle schools, Hopwood has the highest number of students as of yesterday, with 895 enrolled. Principal Jonas Barcinas said this was just the first day and the number is expected to grow.

“We’re anticipating an increase within the next two weeks,” he said.

Dandan Middle School has 352 students so far, according to principal Lynn Mendiola. She also expects the number to go up.

San Antonio had a total of 293 as of yesterday, according to associate school leader Carla Sablan.

Vince Dela Cruz, principal of Chacha Oceanview, said they have a total of 260 students.

Commissioner Sablan said her initial visit at Tanapag showed that the school has the lowest population of all schools that are now open, with only 169 students.

PSS counted more than 207 teachers as of yesterday. These included regular classroom teachers, vocational and physical education teachers, leadership corps teachers, and/or special education teachers.

Tanapag has more than 10 teachers, according to Sablan. Dandan had a total of 20. Mendiola said that they are full capacity with teachers but are still waiting for special education aides.

San Antonio Elementary has 12 teachers. Principal James Sablan said they now have a full complement.

Chacha Oceanview has 14. Dela Cruz said they are missing one leadership corps teacher at the moment.

Hopwood has a total of 43 teachers—a full complement.

KHS has 31 teachers. Staffler noted that three of them are KHS alumni. KHS is still looking for two positions to be filled.

MHS had 45 teachers. Cabrera noted that the school had enough teachers at the moment. SSHS had 32. Aguon said they are still looking to fill one post—a career technical education teacher.

Other school matters
Besides a few shortages of teachers, power and water was the primary problem of some schools. Tanapag and MHS are the only schools that had no power as of yesterday, while water is a minor problem at Tanapag, Kagman High, and Chacha Oceanview, with water running on limited hours.
Dandan, Hopwood, Saipan Southern, San Antonio, and Kagman High had adequate power yesterday. Power at Chacha Oceanview was still a work in progress as of yesterday.
With no definite timeline yet on when full power and water supplies will be restored throughout the island, Sablan said there isn’t any specific date on when regular classes will resume. As of now, students will be attending half days.
All elementary schools will open next Monday, Sept. 14.
Head Start will be conducting orientations from Sept. 14 to 18 and will begin instruction the following Monday, Sept. 21.