the minister of Education of the Dominican Republic (Minerd) will execute a broad program aimed at guaranteeing the correction of structural flaws that make school facilities vulnerable, as well as ensuring that those that are built comply with the technical and design studies required to avoid tragedies in the face of seismic events.
The statement was made by the Minister of Education, Angel Hernandezby leaving the symposium open “resilient schools before seismic events: challenges in the national context”, which takes place from this Thursday and until tomorrow Friday in the extension of the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (UASD) of this city of Puerto Plata.
Read: “Chu” Vásquez and the National Police must imitate Nayib Bukele, says PRM deputy
In this regard, Minister Hernández expressed that “There is a commitment to initiate these works to guarantee that schools have the necessary security, for the well-being of children and their communities.”
Hernández said that the MINERD and the National Office for Seismic Evaluation and Vulnerability of Infrastructure and Buildings (ONESVIE), which is directed by the geological engineer Leonardo Reyes Madera, agreed to start a process of correcting faults in the schools, especially in those located near the seismic fault of the North zone.
“The situation of these buildings has been identified, now it is time to make the corrections of the place and avoid events that are tragic”, emphasized the Minister of Education, and immediately underlined that “If something that should concern us all is the safety of the kids”.
For his part, Reyes Madera said that the symposium seeks, among other things, to motivate policies that seek to build better school buildings for the safety of students, since the priority is to preserve the life and physical integrity of citizens, and in the particular case of the teaching family.
You could read: Director of the National Police: “I have heavy games”
The symposium also addresses the experiences, visions and institutional strategies of countries of Latin America, the Caribbean and the Dominican Republic that have obtained positive results in reducing the seismic vulnerability of school buildings to seismic events, and commemorate the twenty-ninth anniversary (19) of the magnitude 6.5 earthquake that hit Puerto Plata on the morning of September 22, 2003.
Likewise, the event, which promotes working in a coordinated manner and optimizing resources to achieve progress in the shortest possible time to a scenario of security and resilience to seismic events, features talks by Fernando Taveras, director of School Buildings of the Ministry of Education (MINERD); Milagros Nanita, director of the Institute of Higher Education in Diplomatic and Consular Training of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MIREX), as well as Wascar García, director of Civil Defense, Puerto Plata delegation.
In addition, there will be a panel headed by engineers Juan Chalas from the Dominican Society of Seismology and Earthquake Engineering (SODOSÍSMICA); Ramón Delanoy from the National Center for Seismology (CNS-UASD) and Norberto José Rojas Mercedes from the Technological Institute of Santo Domingo (INTEC).
You can read: School students burned a vehicle in protests
Visit to Regional 11
the minister Ángel Hernández took advantage the opportunity to hold a meeting with the deputy director Regional 11 of Puerto Plata, Yojeli Hurtado, and the seven district directors that make up that Regional, where various topics of interest to the educational community were addressed. At the meeting, each director explained the needs of each educational district.
Minister Hernández exhorted the directors of the districts to focus on the pedagogical processes that take place in the classrooms and integrate the entire educational society to find solutions.
