COA finds irregularities in Tesda Gloria Arroyo program

MANILA, Philippines—The Commission on Audit (COA) has uncovered several irregularities, such as fictitious training sessions and the double entry of names, in the Pangulong Gloria Scholarship program implemented by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda).

In its 2010 audit report on Tesda, the COA said the government spent nearly P230 million for the scholarship program but failed to meet its goal of providing jobs immediately to at least 60 percent of its graduates.

Under the program, training schools were required to ensure that at least 60 percent of their graduates were employed immediately after graduation or within 12 months after their completion of training. They were also supposed to establish a tracking system for the graduates.

Tesda entered into an agreement with 22 partners under the enterprise-based group training scheme in 2009. This required funding of P229.423 million.

In response to the COA report, Tesda’s current management said it had formed a team to look into the audit findings, and had taken steps to address concerns about training for work scholarship programs.

The COA found that no real training sessions were held by some of the training schools and technical-vocational institutions.

Interviewed by COA auditors, one student who took the finishing course for call center agents admitted that there was no actual training conducted and he was given P750 to pretend that the training was completed.

Another student also confessed that he did not undergo training but was made to fill and sign documents. A third student said she signed a voucher, got P300 as allowance, but was not trained as well.

The COA explained that it only managed to check 211 graduates out of over 24,000. But it said it was “alarming” that of the 211 graduates, 151 could no longer be located due to invalid contact numbers.

Fake scholars

It also said there was a probability that 42 graduates who were employed were not actually PGS scholars but their training schools were paid. It found that the graduates were already undergoing training in a call center when they were made to sign scholarship vouchers by training providers who visited their company. They were made to sign with the promise that they would get Tesda certificates, but none were issued to them.

The COA also found double entries of names in the same training programs, while on the list of scholars, the same pictures appeared under different names. Some participants also had overlapping training schedules.

As for the employment rate, the COA said only one region was able to meet the target, obtaining a 70-percent employment rate for graduates. There were also some training programs that were not backed by reports on the employment status of its graduates.

Loopholes

The COA attributed the low employment rate to the absence of a penalty clause in the agreement between Tesda and the training schools should the latter fail to meet the targeted employment rate, as well as the lack of a monitoring and reporting system on the employment status of scholars.

There were also no re-evaluation procedures on courses with few enrollees and low employment rates. Graduates were also not required to report their employment status to Tesda or the training schools, it added.

The COA recommended that Tesda take appropriate action against officials responsible for the weak implementation of the program, and explain why the training schools were allowed to continue despite violating the terms of their agreement with Tesda.

Tesda should also create a team to investigate the authenticity of the scholars, majority of whom provided invalid or fictitious contact numbers, it added.

COA added that future agreements should include sanctions for noncompliance with the terms, and there should be alternative solutions to meet the project objectives. There should also be a monitoring scheme to gauge the progress of the project, it added.

In response, Tesda told the COA that it had adopted a stricter selection process for participating technical vocational institutions under the new guidelines for the training for work scholarship program.

Prerequisites

The selected institutions would have to be supported by labor market information and employment facilitation systems, and linkages with placement agencies. They should also have career guidance offices for tracking and job placement. Those who fail to meet targets would not be included in subsequent programs.

On the selection of scholars, Tesda said only applicants with appropriate interests and aptitude would be given slots. Priority would be given to the unemployed coming from families that qualify for the government’s conditional cash transfer program. –Leila B. Salaverria, Philippine Daily Inquirer