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Professionnel Documents
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Amartya Sen
1998 Nobel
Laureate in Economics
9
UNDP, The 2008-2009 Philippine Human Development Report
10
Data from the World Bank
11
Statement was made by former Department of Education undersecretary Juan Miguel
“Mike” Luz in his PowerPoint presentation entitled “A Philippine Report Card for Education:
Social accountability in providing education for all”.
12
Indicators include “(i) literacy rate of 15-24 year olds (youth); (ii) proportion of pupils
starting grade 1 who
reach grade 5; and (iii) net enrolment ratio.”
13
Philippine Institute for Development Studies. Measures for Assessing Basic Education in
the Philippines.
3. Poor Quality of Education. Elementary and high school
graduates “lack competencies to live responsible, productive and self-
fulfilling lives”14. Schools are graduating students who are learning less and
less.15 Achievement in formal basic education is described to be “pathetically
low”16. Only 15.3 percent of elementary school graduates scored 75 percent
in the National Achievement Test. To make matters worse, less than 1.0
percent of high schools made it past the 75 percent mark. In terms of quality
instruction in mathematics, a measly 25.3 percent crossed the mark while a
deplorable 8.4 percent did so in science. Data also showed that students
from one- half of the schools did not learn 60 percent of what they ought to
in both subjects.
14
The 1991 Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM) found in the 2008-2009
Philippine Human Development Report.
15
Former Undersecretary Miguel Juan Luz
16
UNDP, The 2008-2009 Philippine Human Development Report
high school students are fit to enter college. The current basic education
curriculum does not provide a strong foundation in subjects such as math
and science, especially biology and chemistry17. Philippine formal basic
education is one of the shortest in the Asia Pacific, with just ten years of
basic schooling compared to the typical 12 years. Twelve years of basic
education is a key ingredient of good education.18
17
Statement of former Education Secretary Edilberto de Jesus found in the article of Ibarra
Mateo and Yvonne Chua entitled “Elect an ‘education president’, urge school reform
advocates”.
18
Statement of Ramon Del Rosario Jr., chairman of the Philippine Business for Education.
This was found in the article of Ibarra Mateo and Yvonne Chua entitled “Elect an ‘education
president’, urge school reform advocates”.
19
Abby Sanglay and Yasuhiko Matsuda, “Institutional Bottlenecks in Budget Execution:
Cases of Basic Education Programs in the Philippines”, September, 2008. The authors
estimated utilization rate by dividing Total Actual Obligation by Total Available
Appropriations.
fully disbursing its budget to hire new teachers and build more classrooms.
Guidelines in the purchase of furniture and equipment were only released
during the latter part of the year. Sub-allotments from the central to the
implementing agencies in the field took a maximum of ten months to be
issued. It took 9 to 10 months before teachers can be deployed.
The power that Superintendents exert over the purse and the
budget can explain why some of them resent greater oversight over how
resources are managed. Well meaning LGUs and NGOs have reported great
difficulties in expanding membership of the Local School Boards and making
budgeting of the Special Education Fund more participative. The resistance
of Superintendents is strengthened by the provisions of law that restrict
membership of SEF and vests the Local School Board with the power to
disburse the Special Education Fund without scrutiny of the local legislature.
One governor notes the lack of oversight makes the SEF budget especially
prone to corruption.
It was also observed that the DEPED seems to wholly rely on externally
induced reform. “The DepEd’s almost absolute dependence on the
implementation of foreign-assisted programs that have reform activities built
into pilot project components was clearly discernible in the last 20 years.
22
Human Development Network, Philippine Human Development Report, 2008/2009.
23
Ibid.
24
Human Development Network, Philippine Human Development Report, 2008/2009.
Thus, it seems that reform activities were undertaken only as the DepEd
moved from one foreign-assisted program to another.”25
6. Education Agenda
6.1.1. Transparency. At the very least, the DEPED budget, MOOE and
NAT scores of individual schools, bidding results, and prices of
major equipment and supplies must be posted and made
available through the web.
25
UNDP, The 2008-2009 Philippine Human Development Report
6.1.3. Reinventing Local School Boards. Local School Boards must
be reinvented and made functional through an amendment of
the Local Government Code.. Membership in the board should
be expanded to include as many stakeholders who can share the
responsibility of providing quality education, e.g. business sector,
non-governmental organizations; academic community; alumni
associations, among others. The functions of the Board should
be broadened to include: 1) working with the local treasury and
assessment offices in implementing programs that will improve
collection and efficient disbursement of the Special Education
Fund tax; 2) formulating an SEF budget that reflects the
consensus of community members in education summits; 3)
drawing up and implementing non-traditional sources of
financing to support the learning system; 4) provision of
oversight on good governance of schools, 5) development of a
five-year basic Education Development Plan; 6) conducting
education summits at least once a year that will report to the
community progress in implementing education reforms and
consulting community members on issues on basic education;7)
development of a report card system where the performance of
the Local School Board, schools, officials, and parents in
education governance will be benchmarked with respect to
specific success indicators; and, 8) development of a
performance-based teacher incentive system that will be
financed by the SEF.
26
Op. cit
collaboration with community members in decision making on
school policies and programs. Local governments should be
responsible for : 1) allocating additional resources from the
General Fund to support quality basic education; 2) mobilizing
other resource from the local governments, e.g, Sangguniang
Bayan, Sangguniang Kabataan, and Sangguniang Barangay; 3)
reinventing Local School Boards; 4) promulgating ordinances that
will institutionalize reform processes in improving governance of
education; and 5) and construction and maintenance of schools
27
Juan Miguel Luz, “To be Competitive, We need a 12-Year Basic Education Cycle”. The Road to Quality Education
(Philippine Business for Education), June 2008.
6.2.1. Pre-School Education. We need a much organized effort to
get all children ready for school by age six by funding and
organizing a wide variety of early childhood care and
development interventions at homes, communities, and
institutions. DEPED and DSWD should work together in
formulating an early childhood curriculum, defining standards for
recruitment of teachers for pre-school education; and developing
templates for training programs that can be implemented at the
local level. The DILG and the League of Local Governments
should mobilize barangays and NGOs that provide early-child
care education in adopting the curriculum and in training
teachers. This initiative will cost around Php 41.4 billion and if
done incrementally over the next four years, it will cost from 9.6
to 11.1 billion a year. In the absence of new funds, pres-school
education can be financed by the pork barrel.
29
Juan Miguel Luz, “To be Competitive, We Need a 12-Year Basic Education Cycle”. The Road
to Quality Education (Philippine Business for Education), June 2008
30
Ibid.
31
UNDP, op. cit
6.3. Efficiency in the Delivery of Education.
32
Department of Social Welfare and Development, “4Ps Concept Paper for MCC”, January 21,
2009.
33
Sanglay and Matsuda, op. cit.