MANILA – The Department of Education (DepEd) said it will conduct a thorough review of the dismissal ordered by Ateneo de Manila University on a junior high school student for bullying another student.
Secretary Leonor Briones said the department will seek explanation from Ateneo to determine if the school was right in dismissing the student who was caught in a viral video assaulting his peer.
“Automatic ‘yan na kailangan i-review,” Briones told DzMM AM radio. “Sinulatan namin agad ang Ateneo to explain and report kung ano ang nangyari, which will be the basis also of our action para sabihin na tama o hindi iyang ginawa nila.”
She added: “Kailangan tingnan namin nang husto iyung basis ng kanilang desisyon. The school may be held liable if proven that it committed negligence during the incident.”
Briones also said that, in DepEd’s review, Ateneo’s dismissal of the bully student can still be upgraded to “expulsion” if they will find strong grounds to impose the said penalty.
“Kapag dismissal, hindi lang siya puwedeng mag-enroll uli sa Ateneo. But kapag expulsion, he cannot be admitted into any public or private school in the Philippines,” Briones said.
The bully student was dismissed from Ateneo after “a thorough investigation that included listening to all the parties involved,” school president Jose Ramon Villarin SJ said./PN
