Senator sounds alarm on deteriorating competence of students, teachers

Credit to Author: ggaviola| Date: Wed, 06 Mar 2019 10:59:55 +0000

MANILA, Philippines – Senator Sherwin Gatchalian disclosed on Wednesday  the “alarming” state of the quality  of education in the Philippines, particularly the deteriorating performance of students and teachers, which be blamed on the K to12 program.

Gatchalian said that based on research, the results of the National Achievement Test (NAT) for Grace 6 and Grade  10  students in  the last two years have deteriorated.

“Before, Grade 6 was averaging at least above  50 percent and then our Grade 10…it’s barely passing 50 percent.  But in the last two school years, bumaba siya  below  50 percent for both Grace 6 and 10,”  he said during the hearing the  of the Senate committee on education.

In terms of proficiency, Gatchalian noted that the students were did not do too well  in Mathematics, English and  Science.

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Even the performance of teachers has deteriorated, Gatchalian lamented, citing  a previous  study of  the World Bank.

“And we also looked  at the passing rate (of) LET (Licensure  Examination for Teachers). To my surprise, pababa ng pababa ang passing rate ng LET, ng elementary teachers. From 33 percent, ngayon 27 percent,” he said.

“In fact, mas madali pang maging abogado tsaka doctor kesa maging teacher ngayon,” said the senator.

Employment woes

Gatchalian likewise cited a survey conducted by a job recruitment website,  Jobstreet,  last year which showed  that  35 percent of employers are not willing to hire K to 12 graduates  while 41 percent were undecided.

The senator  also mentioned reports that I supposedly  takes  three years for  high school graduate to be employed, while a college graduate has to wait a year.

“And these are indicators that our high school graduates are not ready  to participate in the labor force,” he pointed out.

“And I think it’s quite alarming because we’ve allocated significant amounts of money to DepEd (Department of Education). Half a  trillion pesos na nga binibigay natin pero the  quality  of our education, especially the performance of our students, is going down,” Gatchalian rued.

K-12

In an interview after the hearing, Gatchalian attributed the problem to the K-12 program.

“Malaking dahilan dito e yung K-12 natin at dapat ayusin ang implementation, yung curriculum. At tingnan din kung yung curriculum ay tama at tama yung execution.”

(One major reason behind this is the K-12 program.  The implementation and curriculum must be fixed.  We have to make sure that the curriculum is right and implemented properly.) / gsg

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