La Salle Bro. Armin Luistro was finally appointed to run the Department of Education (DepEd) under the incoming regime of BSA III. And among the first items on his agenda is to “review the sex education program to be implemented in the schools nationwide.” This really alarmed and saddened us. We thought we would hear Luistro putting top priority on how to arrest the falling rate of enrollment in public and private schools. We thought he would lay out some new innovative solutions to the dire straits we are in, if not some radical approaches on how to solve the dismal state of health and nutrition of millions of our starving public elementary students. Instead, Bro. Luistro tells the nation he’s going to focus first on “sex education,” a matter we seriously doubt he has much real experience in. What we were hoping to hear from the incoming DepEd secretary is a policy statement that will allay the fears of those concerned about the private schools’ pilfering of government’s public education budget through the “voucher system,” where public school students are sent to classes of private schools paid for by the government. When Butch Abad was first touted for the Education post, this concept was immediately floated. But the fact is, even the Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines (CEAP), in the June 16, 2010 statement of Msgr. Gerry Santos, has aired fears over the impact of private school students migrating en masse to public and state schools due to tuition fee increases and the increasing economic constraints of Filipino families. It is the public schools and state colleges that should be strengthened in this time of global economic contraction brought about by the exploitative globalist system. And yet why is the reverse being sought? In the same statement, Santos also said that the Catholic private schools continue to experience “a downtrend of enrollment” each year, and lamented that some students from private schools would prefer to stop schooling than face the “shame” of going to public schools. This is how wrong the elitist orientation and culture of many of the private (and top Catholic) schools are — like the “system” of schools Luistro runs. Meanwhile, left without representation in the Cabinet is the public and state educational system which takes care of 86 percent of the total student population (or 20.17 million students) even as only 3.26 million (or 14 percent) are enrolled in private schools. At the same time, primary school enrollment continues to decline alarmingly, as seen in data culled from 2002 to 2007 showing a decline from 90 percent to 83 percent, attributed to “widespread poverty aggravated by rising cost of fuel and food.” Bro. Armin Luistro will have to find a solution to these ever-increasing tuition fees. This year, 332 schools have sought increases that ranged from 7 percent to 20 percent. Just imagine: In an economy where official unemployment has gone up to 8 percent and underemployment to 18 percent (considering that these numbers are already fudged), these increases will be condemning more and more young Filipinos to a future of poverty. There are still more daunting statistics that 24 years of liberalization of the economy and of education under the Yellows have spawned: For every 100 students entering 1st grade, 33 drop out before Grade 5; while for the same proportion of high school freshmen, 31 drop out before finishing the secondary term. In all, only 66.06 percent of high school teenagers go to secondary school. In the midst of these endless life-and-death issues, Armin Luistro is still seriously focusing on “sex education?” Frankly, even if he came from the most exclusive and elitist of schools, Luistro could have still inspired a modicum of hope if he had started to show some understanding of the real priorities in our national education crisis. I would have been more hopeful if I had heard him say that he will initiate a nationwide cable-through-satellite TV education campaign to every one of the approximately 45,000 barangays, which would vastly reduce the need for teachers and administrators; or that he will move to revive the “4H Clubs” in all the elementary schools so that every student can grow food to help themselves and their families. I would have been more encouraged if Luistro had propounded plans to re-regulate all private schools — even standardize their facilities — so that none of them can charge exorbitant fees on the pretext of “upgrading,” especially when such later prove to be unnecessary and wasteful. Nothing short of a revolution can save the growing number of our children and teeners from a future of ignorance and hopeless existence. What we need is a total social revolution that first involves the economy, then spreads to every other facet of society, foremost being the educational system. But can any revolution happen under Luistro who, by all indications, will only continue the prayle system in our nation’s educational milieu? This is truly another sad moment for the BSA III Cabinet. But then, should anyone be surprised when the Code-NGO Peace “Bond girl” Dinky Soliman was one of the very first to get appointed? Well, expect more disappointments to come. (Reprinted with permission from Mr. Herman Tiu-Laurel) Source: The Daily Tribune URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100628com4.html |
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29. Alam n'yo kaya na ngayon ang ika-115 na pagdiriwang ng pinakaunang
labanan ng Himagsikan bago pa man ang pangkalahataang pag-aaklas? Ngayon
unang lum...
14 years ago
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