‘Tape furor is nothing compared to RP education crisis’

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga — With students and teachers scoring low on proficiency exams, Education Secretary Florencio Abad said yesterday the Philippines is facing a crisis in education worse than the political and economic turmoil currently besetting the country.

Abad cited results of the national achievement test conducted for the school year 2004-2005, which showed that fourth-year high school students garnered an average score of 46.80 percent while grade six pupils earned scored an average of 58.73 percent.

Studies also showed that public high school teachers, on the average, scored a dismal 54.62 percent in the "written expression" and 67.74 percent in "reading comprehension" of the English language.

Abad said a self-assessment test conducted among teachers showed that 80 percent of them believe they "have inadequate proficiency" in the use of the English language.

"The political and economic crises we are facing is nothing compared to the crisis in education" that built up over the past three decades, he said.

Abad also expressed concern that high school students in the Philippines ranked 41st out of 45 countries in math proficiency, and 42nd out of 45 countries in science.

He reported that Filipino grade schoolers ranked 23rd out of 25 countries in math and science proficiency.

Abad blamed the crisis in education on three "root causes" — too little investment in education, instability of leadership in the Department of Education (DepEd), and the centralization of the educational system

He pointed out that only about P112 billion or 12 percent of the P907.5-billion national budget was allocated to DepEd.

"About 88.1 percent or P98.7 billion of the education budget is enough only for personal services," Abad said.

He said the frequent change of leadership at the DepEd — five secretaries in four years — had adversely affected the educational system.

"The third problem is something we can manage despite our current political situation. We can improve governance of public education by decentralizing the operations of the DepEd," Abad said.

He said this is his reason for launching the School First Initiative (SFI), which he described as "a program of reforms by government with specific interventions."

Abad said SFI "calls for interaction between education professionals and the community, greater involvement of parents and community leaders, linkage with local government units and local political leaders, taking full advantage of local resources available for education, and using the public school network as a nationwide institutional backbone for local populations securing for themselves benefits of universal basic education."

In order to decentralize the educational system, Abad said he had ordered that budgets for purchases, such as textbooks and furniture, be given directly to DepEd provincial offices.

To address the shortage of classrooms, the DepEd has negotiated with some 1,600 private schools nationwide to allow public school children to use their extra classrooms.

"Our population in public schools is growing by 4.7 percent yearly because the cost of education has driven many to shift from private to public schools, so many facilities in private schools are now underutilized," Abad said.

He added that the DepEd has allocated some P2 billion for the use of the private classrooms — about P4,000 per public school student per year.

Villar: Address Decline In Quality Of Education

Meanwhile, Las Piñas Rep. Cynthia Villar said lawmakers need to find ways of addressing the declining quality of education in the country.

In a statement, she cited the high student-teacher ratio and the shortage of classrooms and textbooks as the main culprits for this decline.

"We cannot expect a miracle from the four or five years that a student spends in college. Any inadequacies in imparting the basic educational principles that should have been learned from pre-school to high school cannot be offset in college," Villar said.

She chairs the House of Representatives’ committee on higher and technical education, which is currently pushing for educational reform measures that would not entail large budget allocations.

Villar’s committee wants to institutionalize the "ladder" system of education as well as "open" and "distance" learning to enable people to pursue higher education with minimal constraints on time, travel and financing. The system would allow students the flexibility of working while studying, and encourage workers to acquire more knowledge and skills since they do not have to leave their jobs.

The committee is also encouraging schools to sponsor the continuing education of their teachers and provide scholarship grants to children of faculty members.

"Good education is a key that can unlock the door to a brighter future for Filipinos. We have to do all that we can to provide them the opportunity to advance in life," Villar said.