Overhauling education system possible—Coseteng

Former Senator Nikki Coseteng believes that overhauling the educational system of the country is difficult, but doable.

The president of Diliman Preparatory School, one of the fastest growing educational institutions in the country today, said that the Department of Education’s biggest and most urgent issues include implementation of relevant curriculum content to current themes in education and situation of students; adequacy of classrooms and sports facilities, science, math and computer laboratories; massive teacher training programs; and on-time full payment of teachers’ salaries and allowances.

The two-term senator said that the DepEd Secretary under the new Aquino administration needs to introduce drastic but realistic changes in the education sector. She said that the major problems of the education department are inadequate, inferior, and dilapidated classrooms, too many students per class, lack of books and extremely inferior quality of books. She advised the department to allocate the highest budget for quality books and teaching materials.

She also observed that students are not given opportunities to excel in music, arts and sports due to the faculty’s lack of expertise and the lack of materials and facilities. She believes that Physical Education (PE) should be introduced at the preschool level and not during grade school in order to produce better athletes that will bring honor to the country. DPS is known to be an institution that fully supports sports, with 100-percent tuition-free scholarships for outstanding student-athletes.

She challenged the new Secretary of Education to give to public school students the same curriculum content as that in private schools and to give teacher training programs that will bring down the number of students per class to a maximum of 45. Some schools today pack more than 70 students in a classroom. The ideal teacher-student ratio is 1:25.

Known to support early childhood education, Coseteng thinks that the DepEd should strengthen pre-school programs to enable children to read and do math by the age of three. Coseteng has brought to the country the Glenn Doman method that pioneered teaching babies to read and DPS uses his methods in its early childhood education program.

An advocate of innovative and progressive education, Coseteng recommends the introduction of astronomy and the creation of an educational platform for subjects in schools. At DPS, Coseteng has taken innovation to the next level with the launching of the DPS Astronomy Center which houses the Philippines’ first ever and only 7-meter diameter digital mobile planetarium. She spearheaded the Discover and Probe the Skies Foundation, Inc. in support for astronomy education and research in the country.

Coseteng said that an educational overhaul is needed. She knows this will be met by raised eyebrows, like what happened when she introduced innovations at DPS. Many frowned upon the changes, especially when it cost millions and millions of pesos. But Coseteng stood firm and transformed DPS into a globally competitive school.

Coseteng wants the whole educational system of the country to achieve what DPS has: creating a state-of-the-art learning environment through an educational program that is future-driven, innovative, holistic, transformative, interdisciplinary and value-laden. She believes that with determination, the incoming DepEd Secretary can also accomplish this. –Robbie Pangilinan, Manila Standard Today