SAN SIMON – Village watchmen from various communities here together with the local police jointly provided assistance to public schools for an organized opening of classes yesterday.
 
The village watchmen stood as guard outside the school gate to maintain an organized flow of students coming in and out of the school premises.
 
This initiative on providing assistance to the students came as they predicted a huge crowd of returning students.
 
Efren Canlas, a village watchman here said aside from regular patrolling during night time in their community, some of them are being regularly assigned to public school gate to ensure safety of the students while going to school.
 
“Matagal na namin ginagawa ito, hindi lamang kung umpisa ng klase kundi araw araw hanggang matapos ang kanilang pag aaral,” he added.
 
Canlas explained that this practice is common in every barangay because there is always coordination between school and community officials.
 
The support from the barangay is timely as the local police has no enough personnel to guard and cover all public schools in the municipality.
 
Earlier, the Pampanga Police Provincial Officer through Senior Superintendent Oscar Albayalde launched Oplan Balik Eskwela to implement security measures and public safety plans for students during school opening.
 
With this, the policemen in all municipalities in the province were deployed in various public schools within their area of their  assignment to provide assistance and ensure a smooth opening of classes.