328 Corrections officers take oath

A total of 328 Corrections officers completed their Corrections Officer Custodial Basic Course (COCBC) during a modest ceremony at the Corrections National Training Institute (CNTI) Parade Ground inside the New Bilibid Prison compound in Muntinlupa City on Thursday.

Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) Director General Gregorio Pio P. Catapang Jr. officiated the oath-taking for the newly graduated Class 2024-02 “DASIG Tikas,” which stands for Disiplinadong Aksyon na may Sinsiridad at Integridad Gabay sa Tungkulin ng Institusyong Koreksyon at Alay sa Sambayanan — para sa Bagong Pilipinas.

Catapang highlighted that this is the largest number of basic recruit course graduates in BuCor’s history. In total, 1,008 graduates completed the COCB course in the first quarter of 2025, thanks to BuCor’s decentralization program, strengthening the ranks of uniformed officers across the bureau.

The Class 2024-02 DASIG-TIKAS is part of a larger initiative that includes several other classes formed under the decentralized training program across different Operating Prisons and Penal Farms.

Aside from the NBP graduates — 315 Corrections officers and 13 Corrections technical officers 1 — other facilities have held or will hold their own graduations. These include the Iwahig Prison and Penal Farm, which graduated 188 trainees on 7 February; Sablayan Prison and Penal Farm with 77 graduates on 10 February; Leyte Regional Prison with 128 graduates on 7 March; and San Ramon Prison and Penal Farm with 92 graduates. The Davao Prison and Penal Farm will hold its graduation on 24 March with 195 COBC trainees.

The COCBC Class 2024-02 “DASIG-TIKAS” underwent six months of in-house training, which included military professionalism, rigorous physical conditioning, firearm proficiency, self-defense tactics, academic lectures and on-the-job experiences.

According to CNTI Chief Superintendent Lucio Guevarra, this batch’s training differed from previous ones as local CNTI units were given the flexibility to set their own training schedules, resulting in varying lengths of training periods and different graduation dates.