(We yield this space to the statement of the Salinlahi Alliance for Children’s Concerns due to its timeliness. – Ed.)
AS EARLY as February 2021 the Senate had called for the Department of Education (DepEd) to improve policies in response to the sharp increase in school dropouts. By July of the same year, the World Bank had revealed that 80% of Filipino students fell below even the minimum level of proficiency for their educational level.
Rather than work to solve these problems that threaten the future of our children and our country, DepEd simply denied the numbers reported. They would go so far as to chide those who had reported mere facts. Schools remain underfunded, lesson plans remain riddled with inaccuracies, and our youth continue to drop out of school at alarming rates.
This negligence will undoubtedly scar the youth who are crushed by the demands of distance learning and the K-12 program with no sight of relief from the government while being kept ignorant, ergo disempowered, by the exclusion of Philippine History in high school. These are evident not only in the numbers revealed by the Senate and the World Bank, but also in instances similar to Pinoy Big Brother’s issue where teenage contestants were unable to recognize GomBurZa – the three Filipino Catholic priests, Mariano Gomez, José Burgos, and Jacinto Zamora, who were executed by garrote on Feb. 17, 1872, in Bagumbayan, Philippines by Spanish colonial authorities.
Should this negligence continue, our nation’s children will struggle to survive in an unjust country without the wisdom of the past and the courage taught by those that fought oppressive elements before us.
As the country suffers from worsening learning loss, Salinlahi calls on the presidential candidates to address education woes by including in their agenda the concerns and issues of Filipino children relating to education. Specifically, Salinlahi demands the government to allocate sufficient funding to the education sector to resolve backlogs in school infrastructures as well as learning and teaching resources. At the same time, DepEd should improve its curriculum by scrapping the K-12 program and work for the immediate safe return of in-person learning.
The country needs a president that will properly respond to our children’s needs, and empower them to become the educated leaders of tomorrow.
