Schools ordered not to use 2 textbooks with major errors

The Department of Education has directed all private schools not to use the books “Simply Science in the Next Century” and “Harnessing English Arts Today” of Phoenix Publishing for Grades 1 to 6 because these contain major errors.

Education Secretary Jesli Lapus notified DepEd regional director Carolino Mordeno that after a review and evaluation made by the Instructional Materials Council Secretariat, these books were found to contain major errors including wrong illustrations and insufficient discussion.

“These books are the ones that are introduced in schools (private) today. We have discouraged them to use these as these contain major errors, may it be conceptual errors, factual errors, misleading or wrong illustrations, and insufficient discussion,” Mordeno told The Freeman.

Citing this matter a cause of national concern and extreme urgency, Mordeno said that Lapus has directed all private educational institutions not to use these two textbooks until these are revised and have passed the content evaluation by DepEd.

“We do not want to compromise our students that is why we are very much vigilant on these matters because we want to give quality education to our schoolchildren,” he said.

It was textbook critic Antonio Calipjo-Go who recently brought to DepEd's attention the "errors he found in textbooks used by private schools," said Mordeno but he clarified that "the books he was referring to were not evaluated or procured by the department."

In a letter to DepEd, Go said that at least six textbooks in Science and six others in English had "erroneous and faulty titles," among other "serious errors." These same books were also "not of good quality," he said.

Undersecretary for legal affairs Franklin Sunga cited Go for his "concern and continuous effort in calling the attention of the DepEd to rectify dysfunctions in Philippine education, especially in the matter of the quality of the content of textbooks being used in our public and private schools."

Sunga said they valued Go's "continuous struggle to have the errors in the textbooks discovered." He also assured Go the DepEd "will immediately address the issues and take appropriate action ... for our children to achieve quality education."

Go meanwhile has repeatedly assailed the DepEd for, among others, its allegedly inadequate and misleading 21-page Errata Guide to correct errors in government-issued textbooks. – Jasmin R. Uy/RAE