Villar eyes teachers’ 6-hour workday

SENATE OFFICE, Manila, May 28, 2011-Senator Manny Villar has filed Senate bill No. 2454 to reduce the working hours condition of all public school teachers to a six-hour workday or a total of a 30-hour workweek and exempting them from compliance with 8 hour workday.

Villar said that to have more time to innovate and enhance classroom teaching and result to a more productive workforce, reducing their number of working hours and they should be given full attention where the teachers clamor for higher pay but shorter working hours, adding that their work schedule leaves them stressed out and exhausted.

The bill repeals Sections 13 and 14 of Republic Act No. 4670 or the Magna Carta of Public School Teachers where the Department of Education issued Memorandum 291 s. 2008 allowing teachers to allot six hours for actual classroom teaching a day, with the remaining two hours to be spent in teaching-related activities like lesson planning, preparation of teaching aids, checking of papers, recording among others; thus, teachers are required to render a total of eight hours a day.

Villar said that a shorter work day would be a great relief for the teachers where he also proposed that any work performed in excess of six hours a day shall be paid an additional compensation of at least 25 percent of their regular remuneration.

He said that the measure seeks to exempt teachers from the generally established rule on 8-hour workday under the Civil Service Rules. Book V of the Administrative Code of 1987 which stated that officers and employees of all departments and agencies except those covered by special laws shall render not less than eight hours of work a day for five days a week or a total of 40 hours a week, exclusive of time for lunch.

Related school activities which are conducted outside the school shall be paid an additional compensation of at least 25 percent of his/her regular remuneration after the teacher has completed at least six hours of work. (Jason de Asis)