Mylene Durante was a teacher. With her home some 44 kilometers away, Mylene slept inside the school in Barangay Oringon, Pio Duran. That night, at 11 p.m., in the Principal’s office, Mylene was stabbed to death. She may have been raped also.
Reports said the teacher was allowed to spend the night in the school for economic reasons—her home was far and the site where the school is located is in a remote, upland barangay. The school could be reached only by walking or by means of habal-habal, a motorcycle fitted with seats to accommodate more passengers.
With the teacher were two Grade 6 pupils who volunteered to accompany Mylene for the night. The two girls suffered minor injuries and were taken to a nearby hospital. The pupils were the one who identified the suspect, a 17-year-old high-school student in another barangay high school.
Abdon Balde, an Albay-based multi-awarded writer and local historian of note, posted the news and with it the demand for “localization.” This means that a teacher who lives in the locality gets to teach in the locality.
Balde, a champion of local languages, spoke mainly of the mother tongue-based education (MTBE), as the reason for the urgency in localization. Balde cites that when a teacher is teacher in his or her own town or community: “1. There is no need to adjust to a new dialect or language because the students shall have a common mother tongue; 2. The teacher need not waste a lot of time and effort and money in traveling to a school that is so far away from home.”
The writer mentions many more logical and reasonable reasons for localization, among these is the impact of the teacher being “truly embedded in the culture of his or her own community and, therefore, knowledgeable about the culture of the people and the history of the place.”
Posted online on Facebook, the comments elicited more comments. Fellow teachers spoke of the difficulties of travel because, usually, when the teacher is not assigned to her own place, she is ultimately placed in villages that are distant and isolated. Lolit Callos’s observation in her language should be quoted: Kadalasan po…yung mga baguhan…tinatapon doon sa remote areas…siempre walang choice. (Very often, the newcomers are thrown to the remote areas, and they have no choice).
Irvin Parco, another writer and a teacher in an elementary school, cites education officials who would ridicule those assigned in far-flung areas by asking them to magharung-harong na lang (to just build their own small homes there, meaning to fend for themselves as there is nothing else that could be done.)
Sad and tragic are two words that teachers and nonteachers alike are voicing out in response to this evil event.
Evelyn Autor, a book author and teacher, laments how such a violent action could happen to a teacher.
Teachers, for all their shortcomings, are generally trained to be genial and kind. Or, they communicate a personality that is welcoming. Whether this is a façade or an exercise in personal psychology does not matter. What is important is teachers put up a character that is conducive to the formation of young minds and for education.
For every cruel teacher whose abrasive actions are monitored and judged upon, I can cite a hundred and thousand whose notions of sacrifice and selflessness are stellar and
beyond question.
Along E. Rodriguez, in Quezon City, can be found a lonely spot, an old mansion. It is called QI or Quezon Institute, an art-deco building designed by Juan Nakpil, National Artist for Architecture. A portion of the lot was already sold to Puregold and the huge land on which the building is has become a coveted real estate.
Inside the Quezon Institute is a Teacher’s Pavilion, a ward devoted to teachers with respiratory ailments. It sounds noble and even commendable how an institution meant to combat tuberculosis could set aside a place, a ward for a particular profession. What that pavilion hides, or not hide, is the fact that teachers do suffer because of that chosen profession.
Along the Teacher’s Pavilion can be found stories that are heartbreaking because they are heroic. Listen to one teacher who had to rush to her classroom to protect the educational devices from the storm. When she reached home, she had a fever, which soon developed into a respiratory affliction. There are more and we have no resources to answer their needs. We only have ourselves and the time we can set aside to visit these teachers.
Soon, the Quezon Institute may be acquired by a corporation and transformed into a breathtakingly lovely mall. It is said that corporations that offer to acquire the prime lot promise to retain the old and heritage-compelling architecture. Good for the history of architecture but we wonder, what will happen to the teacher and their Pavilion? Even as I write this, I may be writing of a place that does not exist anymore.
Along the lonesome streets in rural Philippines we pass by schoolbuildings that can go easily. They are not architectural wonders and we often ask, what happens in those classrooms. We need not inquire what these pupils learn. In a very poor country, for people to learn how to read and write is enough. Teachers do these acts—the moment when boys and girls begin to recognize the alphabets and count the numbers. These teachers teach in places where there are no elegant canteens, where rooms are not air-conditioned. These teachers do not need medals of valor; they need safety and protection and that extra money to enjoy what simple life has to offer.
And so, Mylene Durante is dead. Murdered. She has left two children. It is said she protected her two pupils from the assailant and were thus able to escape.
We will light candles and offer prayers. Those are necessary rituals we have learned in our faith.
In her wake, there will be words of consolation. For the school officials, the world will reserve the speeches of commendation. Some of us will even attempt to raise funds for her. These acts are good.
But, Irvin Parco pleads that we stop calling teachers “the new heroes.” Those must be the plea of the other teachers, as well.
Let us call our teachers human beings. They need the basic protection and respect from us. The medals? They should be reserved for the officials of the Department of Education. Given the state of education around us, these officials truly deserve the gold, the silver and the bronze.
E-mail: titovaliente@yahoo.com
Image credits: Jimbo Albano