I first saw this adorable girl while I was riding on a tricycle in Bato on my way to Virac. (Yes, that was my form of transportation on my recent vacation to the Philippines as I was trying to save on gas.) She was dressed in that beautiful checkered outfit standing outside her house. I was fascinated by her looks and wondered which school in Bato she went because of how beautiful her whole ensemble looked. I thought she went to some private school in town.

Then, one afternoon, a friend of mine in high school paid me a visit in my place. She had with her a letter. I didn’t read it right away because I basically knew what it was all about. Solicitation letters abound in the province and they usually target the abroaders/bakasyonista. Gosh, I get about 4 to 5 solicitation letters whenever I go home, and sometimes, I avoid going into places just for this reason. Or I usually time my vacation when there are no scheduled fiestas so I can avoid solicitors. 4 to 5 of these add up, you know, and money doesn’t grow on trees abroad.

But this letter is not just any ordinary solicitation letters. This involves young and beautiful children with disabilities, one of whom belongs to my friend. My friend’s eyes welled up and her voice broke as she narrated her story about her son, Mark. She said, for some unexplained reason, the nurses who assisted her in the delivery chose not to disclose the information about her son until later when she discovered the truth herself. I didn’t quite understand why nurses had to do that. Of course, my friend blamed them big time for it.

Her son and the other 15 children with disabilities including the cute little girl above have been living with the reality of exclusion. These children have no access to rehabilitative care or support service, and unable to acquire proper education. They are often viewed as mentally challenged, and so people would treat them differently. In many cases, these children are often withdrawn from community life. Nevertheless and regardless of what/who they are, they require special attention and care otherwise, they risk living in exclusion in a more emotionally disturbed state for their rest of their lives.

Sped classes in the town of Bato have currently 16 pupils coming from different baranggays and all are crammed in a classroom without facilities and needing repairs. Actually, they only have one book at this moment, and a colorful ABC puzzle. I was told that some of these children have been enrolled in same classes repeatedly, and couldn’t quite keep up with the core curriculum in the regular classes. Thus, the need of SPED classes has been implemented to give these kids a place where they will receive specialized instructions by special educators to reach their full potential.

But the sad reality is the school is not solely owned by the Department of Education, but by the LGU, the community and the stakeholders, and it hardly has anything to start with. And for this reason, they turn to you for help to carry out this noble undertaking, be it in cash or kind like TV set, DVD player, ceiling fan, used computers, kids’ educational toys, etc so they can provide the best education possible for these children.

This is all that the kids have at this moment and a book.

I asked them to form their names from the letters on the table.

And here’s what Noel came up with. He got stuck on his last name.

I believe he is 16 years-old yet he has difficulty putting his name together.

Here’s 18-year old Melagrosa reading a second grade textbook. Considering her age, she was the best reader of the whole class. See Desiree in the background? Poor girl, she never says a word.

One and only textbook they have, so far.

If you would like to help and would like to get a hold of the SPED teachers, please contact the following persons:

Marites O Tatel - cell # 09102529823; email add: mababe_ot@yahoo.com

Regina Rojas- cell # 09065713951; email add: eeza_30@yahoo.com