The price of education

CEBU, Philippines - It is still vacation, but Joecerlie Pelostratos and husband Lando have to work hard every day for the coming school year. Joecerlie, a contractual worker at the Talisay City Hall, and Lando, a chorizo maker, will be sending their children to grade school, high school and college.

The Pelostratoses' youngest, 13, is an incoming grade six pupil, the middle child will be a third year high-school student and the eldest, a freshman in college. Even though they will be all attending in public schools, Joecerlie said they will still need at least P3,000 for the school supplies, new bags to change the worn out ones and uniform especially for their youngest and eldest, the middle child will have to make do with her old school uniform. Joecerlie only makes P220 per day as a contractual employee at the City Hall while Lando goes home with P400 if he gets lucky. Their daily food, transportation allowance for the working couple, monthly utilities, and others are also in the family's priority list.

“Kung dili gyud mi katigum ani hapit na raba gyud ang opening, mangutang nalang,” she said. Joecerlie is, however, thankful that public schools are accessible in her area. Her grade school and high school kids have been attending Talisay Central School and Cansojong National High School for the last five and two years, respectively. And since both schools are covered by the Department of Education's (DepEd) no -collection policy, her only concerns are their daily allowance: P25 for the grade schooler and P35 for the high school student. Joecerlie said she has to prepare packed lunches for them so she can save, as the daily allowance is for snacks and transportation only. Her college student, meanwhile, will be enrolled at the state-owned Talisay City College (TCC), which is just a walking distance from their house, and with which Joecerlie already struck an agreement that she will only be giving a P20 daily allowance, P15 less from her daily allowance while in high school. Joecerlie said it is an advantage to them that TCC is just two blocks from their house. It is also another advantage to the family that the school's tuition fee per semester is only P4,000, a far cry from private schools' five or six figures. But Joecerlie said, for her family who only thrives from what little they get every day, it will still be an additional expense for them. Considering this as another burden, she said she has to make sure her eldest, who will be taking up a Bachelors in Elementary Education degree, gets an Alay Lakad Foundation scholarship, the city's program for its deserving and indigent students. This way, they would save P2,000 from semestral fees as the foundation shoulders P2,000 of each of its scholars' tuition fees at the TCC.

“Pasalamat lang sad gyud ko nga naa na'ng TCC kay og wa, ambot og makapa-eskwela ba mi ani niya,” she said. Originally, her eldest would have wanted another course, but since it is not offered in TCC, she had to agree with what the family could give her.

For her part, Menchulyn Dagode is glad that she only has two children, and she has other sources of income. Menchulyn has an incoming second year college student at the Cebu Aeronautics, whose tuition fees per semester is about P20,000. With the distance from Talisay City, where the family lives, to the school (Lapu-Lapu City), she has to allocate P200 for her college student's daily allowance. And although the education of her youngest, who will be a high school freshman at the Saint Scholastica's Academy, is being sponsored by her mother-in-law, Menchulyn said she still has to set aside for his daily allowance and school requirements. She and her husband, who are job-order employees at the Talisay City Hall for years, earn P300 per day each.

Good thing her small business-a shop that sells beauty products-is doing well. She also sells dry goods and other stuffs at the City Hall to augment her income. "Di mada kung magsalig lang kas imong sweldo uy, bisag sa kaon lisod kaayo. Pila ra gud among adlaw. Di gyud siguro namo mapa-eskwela sa private school among mga anak, unya sardinas ug noodles lang mi pirmi," she said.

Clara Falcone, spokesperson of DepEd 7, said every school year, they note a 2 percent increase in enrollees in both public and private schools, elementary and secondary. This increase is attributed to new students and transferees, she said. By transferees, Falcone is referring to the students from private schools who have moved to public institutions. It is not part of the DepEd study to find out the cause of the transfer, but reportedly it is because of the increasing tuition fees in most private schools.

All local government units in Cebu have their public elementary and high schools already, but not all have private schools. In most cases, students from the provinces, especially those from the well-off families have to travel to Cebu City or urban areas, which have private schools. Falcone said that while it may be true that most private schools, if not all, have high standards in education, the public ones are also not far behind. Proof of this are the public school students faring well in national achievement tests. But she said it is always the parents' choice where to send their children, wherever they can afford.

There is stark difference with tuition fees in public and private schools. The yearly tuition fee in one of the international schools in Cebu City, for one, is a little over P500,000 for grade one students. A staff from the school said the amount includes the entrance fee, imported school supplies and testing fees. The amount, the staff added can be paid on a quarterly basis, except for the entrance fee.

Another private school in Cebu City offers grade one for over P40,000 a year, plus a P3,000 testing fee. The amount can be paid quarterly also, but a discount is given to parents who will pay full tuition. High school tuition for the same school is pegged at over P45,000.

DepEd in Central Visayas noted that for school year 2009-2010, only 81.38 percent of school-age children were enrolled in the elementary level, which means 18.62 percent or 186,793 did not go to school. In high school, the participation rate was even way below at 54.49 percent, which means that 45.51 percent or 279,430 school-age children did not go to high school. This is despite the free education provided by the government.

The Philippines has an outstanding agreement during a World Conference on Education for All (EFA) in Jomtien, Thailand in 1990 and committed to raise the participation rate of school-age children to 100 percent in both grade and high school by 2015. However, for some reason this goal was adjusted to 95 percent for the elementary level and 80 percent for high school. -/QSB (FREEMAN)