If your barangay's national high school carries its own name today, there is a good chance it was once just an "annex" of Bislig City National High School. At least eight public high schools across Bislig started that way, and each one became independent only after Congress passed a separate law for it.

The laws are short and nearly identical, and they are all on the public record. Here is what they show.

The eight schools and their laws

The first two separations happened in 2010, under laws dated February 10, 2010:

  • San Jose National High School, formerly the San Jose Annex in Barangay San Jose (Republic Act No. 9984)
  • Mone National High School, formerly the Mone Annex in Barangay Mone (Republic Act No. 9985)

Six more followed in a span of less than a month in late 2012, all signed by President Benigno S. Aquino III:

  • Tumanan National High School, Barangay Tumanan (Republic Act No. 10191, October 18, 2012)
  • Mabog National High School, in Sitio Mabog, Barangay San Roque (Republic Act No. 10200, October 18, 2012)
  • Sta. Cruz National High School, Barangay Sta. Cruz (Republic Act No. 10219, October 18, 2012)
  • Bucto National High School, Barangay Bucto (Republic Act No. 10220, October 18, 2012)
  • San Isidro National High School, Barangay San Isidro (Republic Act No. 10236, October 29, 2012)
  • San Vicente National High School, Barangay San Vicente (Republic Act No. 10258, November 15, 2012)

The Bucto law adds one telling detail. It refers to the school as "Bislig City National High School, Bucto Annex (Annex VIII)," a sign of how many outposts the mother school was running across the city's barangays.

Why a law was needed

An annex operates as part of its mother school. Public national high schools are created and funded by the national government, so turning an annex into a separate school, with its own identity and its own place in the national budget, was done through an act of Congress.

Each Bislig law follows the same pattern. It separates the annex from Bislig City National High School and converts it into "an independent national high school." It transfers all of the annex's personnel, assets, liabilities and records to the new school. It tells the Secretary of Education to fund the new school at first from the current year's appropriation for the annex, and after that through the yearly General Appropriations Act.

It took years to pass

These were not quick laws. According to the text of the acts, the bills for San Isidro and Bucto national high schools passed the House of Representatives on June 6, 2011, and those for Sta. Cruz and Tumanan passed the House on February 22, 2011. The Senate approved all four on July 24, 2012, and they were signed that October.

Why annexes existed in the first place

Annexes bring high school classes closer to students in outlying barangays. For families in places like Tumanan, Mone or Bucto, an annex meant teenagers no longer had to travel to the city center every day to finish high school. Independence was the next step: a school that can plan, hire and grow on its own.

Several of these schools remain part of daily life in Bislig today. San Jose National High School, for one, was cited in a July 2026 Philippine Information Agency report on the city's new DICT Digital Transformation Center, where its students had previously relied on paid "piso" Wi-Fi to do research.

Sources: Republic Acts No. 9984, 9985, 10191, 10200, 10219, 10220, 10236 and 10258, via the Lawphil Project of the Arellano Law Foundation.