PH unlikely to meet its education targets—US report

Philippines—Washington believes the Philippines is “unlikely” to meet its second Millennium Development Goal (MDG) or achieving universal primary education by 2015, according to a report of the US embassy in Manila furnished the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

The embassy cited, among others, the “2010 Education-for-All Global Monitoring Report,” where the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (Unesco) referred to the Philippines as a “country that should not have had difficulty in meeting its targets.”

Unesco also said “achieving universal primary education has been a formality given (the country’s) wealth and starting point.”

But “despite policy, curricular, and programmatic changes, key performance indicators, particularly for basic education, have either stagnated or in some cases, shown negative trends.”

“The Unesco report notes that even as the number of illiterate adults fell in the East Asia region, the Philippines experienced a large increase in adult illiteracy—over 1.4 million new adult illiterates in the period 2000-2007,” said the embassy.

The Aquino administration has allocated over P271.6 billion as the education sector’s total budget for 2011, surpassing the appropriations of any of its predecessors.

However, the embassy said “resource gaps have grown larger as funding has generally not kept pace with the pace of population growth and increasing demands.”

The US embassy took note of the fact that only 2.3 percent of the Philippines’ gross national product has been invested in education even as the average in the East Asian Region has reached 3.9 percent.

The mission also cited the following negative trends:

* Net enrollment ratios have stagnated, increasing the number of children who dropped out of the formal school system;

* Cohort survival rates leave much to be desired and point to education system inefficiencies;

* Teacher training facilities in the country appear to be ill-prepared to produce teachers for effective performance in the classroom;

* Despite the existence of several world-class quality higher education institutions, the bulk of higher education institutions fail to prepare graduates to compete successfully in the local and global economy. Those who are fortunate enough to obtain an education too often find a mismatch between the knowledge and skills associated with higher education degrees and employer expectations.

According to the embassy, “regional disparities further complicate the picture.”

“The education situation in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), Zamboanga Peninsula and Sarangani is particularly dismal,” it said.

Citing the 2008 Functional Literacy, Education and Mass Media Survey, the mission said “while the school dropout rate in Mindanao is about 10 percent compared to 6 percent nationally, it reached nearly 18 percent in the ARMM. The Eastern Visayas region is the only other region that approximates similar statistics.”

The US embassy report acknowledged the Department of Education’s various efforts over the years to stop the negative trends in education, and these efforts included dropout prevention programs and reforms in the overall education sector management.

“Foremost among these is the Basic Education Sector Reform Agenda, an overarching policy framework launched in 2006 to improve overall sector performance, which was recently reviewed by the World Bank but findings are not yet available. Circular reform was also undertaken and many important programs were launched, such as School-based Management and Government Assistance to Teachers and Students in Private Education, along with an Information and Communications Technology for Education strategy and the Adopt-a-School program.”

The US embassy report pointed out that while international donor assistance for the sector has been “robust, especially for the poorest areas in Mindanao,” efforts at reform have not been well-coordinated for optimal results.

Citing the “2010 Education Outcomes in the Philippines” working paper of the Asian Development Bank, among other studies, the mission said “the leading cause of poor learning outcomes and rising school dropout rates remains widespread poverty.”

“Lack of access to rudimentary sanitation and health care has also been cited as a leading factor contributing to poor basic education outcomes particularly in the ARMM,” it also said.

According to the embassy, “resource constraints and resulting shortages of teachers, principals, materials, and classrooms persist and are particularly dire in the ARMM, where 70 percent of schools operate without principals and many schools are not able to offer a full cycle of elementary education.”

“Inadequate teacher qualifications and capacities of school administrators are also recognized as shortcomings. Weak education system governance, including the incomplete implementation of education sector decentralization (which began in 1991 but is fully implemented only at the high school level) is also cited,” it said, adding “an overly rigid and overly bloated bureaucracy managing the sector is an integral part of the problem.”

The US Agency for International Development, or USAID, is using these data as “background” information in its “Philippine Education Sector Assessment” project.

USAID is soliciting proposals from both US and non-US educational organizations to come up with a comprehensive assessment of the Philippine education sector.

“While many research studies have been undertaken by a variety of (foreign) donors and domestic organizations, and government data on education is generally available in the Philippines, there is not a single comprehensive, sector-wide assessment that describes the condition of all sub-sectors and identifies the many government and donor-supported programs working to improve sector trends,” said the mission.

The assessment aims to guide USAID in its new education sector priority-setting process.

“Special consideration should be given to the ARMM where needs are among the greatest in the country,” the embassy added.

For the period 2009 to 2013, USAID has set aside $180 million (nearly P8 billion) in its program to “invest in people to reduce poverty” in the Philippines.

The program, which is part of Washington’s country assistance strategy for Manila, aims to “improve the quality of and access to educational opportunities for children and youth,” as well as improve the quality and accessibility of health services, support biodiversity conservation, and support disaster preparedness and mitigation projects.

Other USAID allocations for the five-year period include $187 million (about P8.3 billion) for accelerating economic growth; $142 million (about P6.3 billion) for peace and security activities; and $51 million (about P2.26 billion) for strengthening governance, rule of law, and the fight against corruption. –Jerry E. Esplanada, Philippine Daily Inquirer MANILA