Video…….

The learning crisis in Philippine education:

 The Philippine Education Sector faces a learning crisis. Based on the World Bank’s 2022
report on the State of Global Learning Poverty, the Philippines’ learning poverty ranks
among the highest in the Asian region, at 90.9%.
 In the 2023 WB report, however, the Philippines was still among eight nations
that registered a learning poverty rate higher than two-thirds, or 67 percent,
despite the return of in-person classes in schools in November 2022. The other
seven are Cambodia, Kiribati, Laos, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, Tonga and
Tuvalu.
 This means that nine in every 10 Filipinos aged 10 years old need to be taught how to
read and to develop their reading comprehension.
 the quality of Philippine education fares no better
 In 2019, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) results showed that
80% of Filipino learners have not reached the global minimum competency levels for
education.
 The country scored the lowest in reading, and second lowest in math and science among
the 79 participating countries.
 PISA is a worldwide study, done every 3 years, that evaluates education systems in
nations around the globe.
 To address this learning crisis, the Eighteenth Congress created EDCOM II to provide for
an objective assessment and examination of our education system.
What is ED COM?
 The Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM II) is a national
commission tasked to undertake a comprehensive national assessment and evaluation of
the performance of the Philippine education sector.
 EDCOM II follows in the footsteps of the First Congressional Commission on Education,
established by a Joint Resolution of the Eighth Philippine Congress on June 17, 1990.
The findings from EDCOM I answered the need to make the Philippine Education Sector
more responsive, efficient, equitable, competent, and effective.
Introduction
Education moved away from a knowledge-based and instructor-centered paradigm in the 1990s.
However, the Philippines has been slow in shifting to learning and lifelong learning. After three
decades, educational institutions have yet to embrace learning and learner-focused philosophies,
models, and delivery systems. Although several educational institutions adopted learning-
focused models long before the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, teachers in
many schools continued using traditional teaching methods, with learners passively listening
without engaging, thinking, and exercising their brains. While the pandemic catalyzed changes in
teaching and assessment across the education system, achieving learning outcomes at all levels
remains a significant challenge for the country. Equally important is the urgent need to deal with
the devastating impact of factors affecting learning. These include (1) persistent poverty and
other structural constraints such as malnutrition and stunting; inequitable access to early
childhood education, educational resources, and home support; and circumstances that compel
students from disadvantaged households to drop out of formal schooling in the early grades; (2) a
cultural penchant for a college diploma regardless of program quality, resulting in a low
valuation in the public mind of technical and vocational training; (3) education budgets and
infrastructure support below global minimum standards; (4) the persistent mismatch between the
skills and competencies honed in schools and the changing employment/entrepreneurial work
requirements that reflect (a) the lack of competencies development or the development of
transferable skills in all courses—considering that in the 21st century, people are no longer
expected to stay in jobs aligned with their college course and (b) weak academe-industry
linkages; (5) snags in developing viable research and innovation ecosystems; and (6) inadequate
preservice quality and context-specific in-service training in basic education.

Where are we now?

Early childhood education challenges

Early childhood education is essential for reducing learning lags and achieving success in school.
Since the 1990s, the proportion of children aged 3 to 4 attending prekindergarten increased from
3 to 40 percent.1 Kindergarten participation also increased significantly from 49 percent of
Grade 1 students attending kindergarten in 1998 to 98 percent in 2017 (Abrigo and Francisco
2023).
While the increase in pre-kinder and kindergarten participation is remarkable, the early
childhood education sector faces at least four challenges:
 (1) chronic malnutrition
 (2) the 20:1 ratio of children to child development workers reported in early 1 Based on
the 2019 Annual Poverty Indicator Survey data childhood care and development, which is
above the recommended ratios (PBED 2023b)
 (3) the reports of the Department of Education (DepEd) that 75 percent of the 3 percent
who did not complete elementary schooling between school year (SY) 2018–2019 and
SY 2019–2020 dropped out between kindergarten and Grade 4, of whom about 60
percent dropped out between kindergarten and Grade 1 (DepEd 2022);
  (4) the need to articulate a framework for early childhood education and assess its quality.

Stunting is the most bothersome among these challenges, given its profound implications for the
country’s future human resources. One in three Filipino children under five years old is stunted,
and the Philippines is among the top 10 countries in the world with the highest number of
malnourished and stunted children (World Bank 2021).

Basic education woes or distress

 Increasingly unfavorable data show the Philippine education system treading on thin ice.
(implies a precarious or risky situation, suggesting that the Philippine education
system is facing significant challenges and may be at risk of encountering serious
problems if not addressed promptly.)
 90.9% could not read and understand a simple age-appropriate text at age 10 (WBO)
 With the longest school closure among 122 countries and highly unequal access to the
internet, digital education resources, and home support, the COVID-19 pandemic
exacerbated the situation.
 In 2018, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) showed that only 1
out of 5 Filipino students achieved a minimum proficiency level in reading and
mathematical

 These results highlight the following observations:

1. Low proficiency across the board.

 The proficiency level of Filipino students across social class, rural and
urban residence, gender, language at home, type of school, and early
childhood attendance is dismally low
2. Better performance from private schools.
 Students from private schools perform better on tests, but their share of
enrolment is continuously dwindling.
 however, that the country’s public schools, which make up about 90
percent of elementary and 80 percent of secondary schools, are of uneven
quality, with the performance of the best-performing public schools likely
comparable to private schools.
3. Multiple interconnected challenges.
 Students’ low test scores correlate with the late start of formal schooling at
Grade 1 (Orbeta et al. 2020)
 ; lack of parental support and low models of aspirations (Orbeta et al.
2020; Bernardo 2023)
  lack of resources in school, such as learning materials and classrooms
(Trinidad 2020)
 absence of information and communications technologies at home
(Bernardo 2023);
 prevalence of bullying and lack of discipline in school (Orbeta et al.
2020).
 in general, an average 18-year-old Filipino student learns less in school
than his/her counterpart in comparator countries (Orbeta and Paqueo
2022).
Challenges affecting teacher performance also need to be addressed, as teachers are crucial to
learning
 Among the issues requiring much-needed interventions include subject
matter knowledge and pedagogical competencies, especially in high
school, vis-à-vis the task of honing 21st-century skills (DepEd 2022)
 the 56-percent passing rate of teacher education institutions in the Board
Licensure Examination for Professional Teachers, which is below the 12-
year national passing rates and lower than the passing rates of other
professional board examinations (PBED 2023a)
 ; lack of alignment with the Professional Regulation Commission since the
licensure examination, albeit resulting in low passing rates, is also the
gateway for subpar teachers to be employed;
 lack of teacher capacity to develop foundational reading and numeracy
skills in the early grades, hampering the learning progress in later years
(DepEd 2022);
 poor analytical, synthesis, and evaluation skills and overall lack of
preparedness to teach (RCTQ 2017)
 a pupil-teacher ratio that is among the highest in ASEAN (PBED 2023b)
 lack of support for teaching and educational resources on the ground to
ensure the proper implementation, feedback, and evidence-based
assessment of an intended curriculum;
 work demands, including administrative work and community service, that
take significant chunks of time away from classroom teaching.
Technical and vocational education concerns
 Although increasing in number over the years, public and private training institutions
face several challenges.
 For instance, allocation and spending on technical and vocational education and training
(TVET) increased recently, but its spending share in the GDP remains low (Paqueo
2023).
 TVET MEANS to provide students with the skills and knowledge they need to
succeed in their chosen career, and to help address any skills gaps in the job
market.
 A survey by Orbeta et al. (2021) shows that the top reason hindering the youth from
pursuing TVET is the lack of funding for tuition or allowance
 Despite the challenges, TVET enrollment and graduates are rising—

 Despite these developments, the TVET sector faces several challenges.

1. higher proportion of graduates from community-based training modes that are
mostly not covered by training regulations that standardize delivery and enable
assessment;
2. employers not giving commensurate importance to TVET certifications—with 60
percent of graduates not receiving incentives despite possessing National
Certificates (NCs)
3. more than a third of graduates not getting NCs after graduation (Orbeta 2021);
4. structural and mindset constraints to the acceptance of TVET credits—more so of
learning outcomes from nonformal and informal learning modes—as equivalent
to required courses even in ladderized higher education programs.
Higher education issues
 Access to higher education in the Philippines remains elusive
 e. Only 17 percent of the country’s poorest households are enrolled in higher education
institutions (HEIs) compared to 49 percent from the wealthiest decile
 This disparity is unsurprising because household income is the primary determinant of
higher education enrollment, with many students from poor households dropping out
early in the education ladder (Bautista et al. 2023).
 The quality of higher education is also uneven, as reflected in the relatively poor
performance of graduates in board licensure examinations
 From tracer data of a nationally representative sample of 11,447 college graduates from
SY 2008–2009 to SY 2010–2011, Tutor et al. (2021) found that graduates do not consider
having developed sufficient communication, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills.
 Seven out of 10 graduates also claim the irrelevance of their college degrees to their first
job, while 1 in 4 believe their outdated skills prevent them from landing good jobs.
Nearly half of the students who graduated from programs requiring professional licenses
(49%) consider a mismatch between their jobs and degrees (Tutor et al. 2021).
Cross-cutting challenges
In addition to urgent issues confronting specific education sectors, the country’s education
system faces the following cross-cutting challenges:
 Lack of coordination among relevant government agencies in adopting,
substantiating, and implementing a lifelong learning (LLL) framework and relevant
policies,
 A national definition and framework for what constitutes LLL programs,
drawn independently from various government agencies and civil society
groups to substantiate the Philippine Development Plan’s recognition of the
value of LLL; −
 Seamless mapping of foundational learning necessary for lifelong and life-
wide possibilities for a productive and fulfilled existence; −
 Constructive alignment of the lessons/training plan/syllabi and the curriculum
to general and specific learning outcomes; −
 Resource (e.g., stable internet connections and the provision of digital
technologies) and training support to mentors to achieve learning outcomes
through level-appropriate, technology-enhanced/mediated, and evidence-
based learning delivery modes, pedagogy, and assessment that the COVID-19
pandemic helped catalyze;
  − Recognition of prior formal and informal learning and implementation of
the credit transfer and banking system;
 − Mechanisms for pathways and entry and exit points in the formal education
system to allow individuals to weave in and out of the formal system for
employment and entrepreneurial activities, among other reasons; and
 − Alignment with the Philippine Qualifications Framework and the Philippine
Skills Framework using learning outcomes as metrics;
 An unharmonized and unevenly implemented quality assurance system that requires
being more mindful of the typology and mandates of institutions and the value of a
coordinated system of performance measures—especially coordination in the
formulation of performance standards;
 An undefined principle of complementarity between public and private education
institutions that contribute to the current private education crisis and the need for an
authoritative articulation of the theory and logic behind this principle to guide its
application;
 Absence of a clear policy for establishing local universities and colleges, SUCs, and
their satellite campuses.
 Lack of a roadmap to operationalize the Philippine education system’s commitment to
achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (e.g., green and digital transformation)
in the different education levels;
 Undefined role of local government units in the governance of the education system;
and
 Overall unequal access to quality education requiring sustainable policies and
programs for inclusive education across the country’s education system.

Quo vadis Philippine education?

 The shocking news about the country’s learning poverty, its dismal performance
in PISA and TIMMS, the unconscionable stunting of one out of three under five-
year-old children, the unprecedented challenges of the pandemic-induced shift in
learning delivery modes, unemployability of graduates, and other perennial issues
jolted the education system. These have raised public awareness of a “learning
crisis” that does not only reflect education issues but the state of Philippine
society.
 the learning crisis prompted an urgent review of the entire education system.
 A system is defined as “a regularly interacting or interdependent group of items
forming a unified whole.” By this standard, the education system in the
Philippines struggles to meet the criteria of a ‘system.’

 , these efforts have been handicapped by:
 (1) sheer overload (with many agencies relying on a multitude of contracts of
service personnel to perform duties that have expanded beyond their respective
charters) (2) lack of and fear of accountability (with many government personnel
fearing audit disallowances and thus crafting policies that are often too rigid to
realistically implement), and (3) internal culture (which is often adjusted to the
socioeconomic and political realities of their organization).
 It specifically compelled the creation of a Second Congressional Commission on
Education (EDCOM II) that identified 28 priority areas for intervention in early
childhood education, basic education, higher education, teacher education, TVET,
lifelong learning and learning pathways, and education governance and finance,
along with specific issues under each of these areas needing unpacking, legislative
or executive action, as well as civil society, people’s and private sector initiatives.
 EDCOM II is a high-level commission mandated to legislate frameworks and
policies to address the learning crisis. While the resolution of the crisis will
ultimately depend on carrying out appropriate reformist policies on the ground
and iteratively adjusting them during implementation, the timely constitution of
the Commission is a welcome shot in the education arm because it offers a rare
opportunity for a more nuanced understanding of issues through research and
nationwide stakeholder consultations. More importantly, it promises to provide a
platform for consolidating interventions and initiatives of diverse groups that
work in and for the education sector, forging partnerships across networks of
education reform advocates, and buoying up an all-of-society stake in the state of
Philippine education. Optimizing the platform EDCOM II could open might begin
to move the Philippines out of its learning crisis toward a brighter future for
Filipino children.