MANILA – The long-sought salary hike for public school teachers might finally be realized. Senators vowed to prioritize salary increase and additional grants of teachers in recognition of the critical role they play in the lives of the children and in nation building.
Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri said over the weekend that there are several measures that are pending at the Senate seeking an upgrade on the salary and benefits of public school teachers.
“I shall push for pay hikes and direct grants to teachers and prioritize the bills filed in the Senate. Our teachers deserve more than we have managed to give them such as salary increases in line with the Salary Standardization Law in 2015,” Zubiri said.
Zubiri, the Senate’s Majority Leader, has filed Senate Bill No. 104 pushing for P10,000 monthly additional pay, grant of bigger chalk allowance, P1,000 annual medical check-up allowance and giving the Magna Carta benefits of the teachers.
“If President Duterte would push through with his promise during the State of the Nation Address to double public school teachers’ salaries, we will help him find the sources of funds as that would entail additional P343.7 billion,” Zubiri said.
Zubiri also pointed out that the proposed 2020 Department of Education (DepEd) budget for salaries is P417,548,392,000, which he said will make the country “the greener pasture of which the teachers had been dreaming.”
“The DepEd have experienced difficulty in hiring more teachers every year,” he said. “The public school system has been losing qualified teachers to other industries such as call centers and service industries.”
Meanwhile, Sen. Juan Edgardo Angara, finance committee chair, said over the years, the salaries of policemen and soldiers have gone up, but the teachers pay remained the same.
He added apart from their personal expenses, many of the teachers have to spend a portion of their salaries for the purchase of teaching supplies because many times they do not get enough from their budgets to pay for these.
Sen. Pia Cayetano, for her part, said raising the compensation of teachers was the best affirmation of government’s high regard for the country’s educators and their contributions to nation-building.
Cayetano has filed Senate Bill No. 70, or the ‘Additional Support and Compensation for Educators in Basic Education Act.’
Oct. 5 has been declared World Teachers’ Day by the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in recognition of teachers’ role in the delivery of quality education. (With GMA News/PN)
