ACT: Bid to make senior high optional shows failure of K to 12 program
MANILA, Philippines — After a House measure was filed tweaking the duration of basic education, an organization of teachers has called on the government to shorten high school back to four years and scrap the K to 12 program altogether.
"Making Grade 11 and 12 voluntary is essentially an admission that the K-12 program is a failure," ACT chairperson Vladimir Quetua said.
Quetua was referring to House Bill 7893 filed by Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (Pampanga) on Wednesday which makes grades 11 and 12 optional for students who prefer to graduate "soonest" from high school.
The measure filed by the House senior deputy speaker converts the current senior high school curriculum into “pre-university education” required only for those proceeding to college or university.
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ACT said there is "no point" in continuing to offer grades 11 and 12 as "not a single study has found (the program) to be effective."
"Grade 11 and 12 teachers are better absorbed in the junior high school, senior high schools can be converted to junior high schools, to help address the teacher and classroom shortage and enable the reduction of class size to manageable levels," Quetua said.
ACT: K to 12 'not for genuine national development'
Quetua also repeated the group’s call to junk the K to 12 basic education curriculum, which he argued was "not designed to bolster a genuine national development program" and only worsens the perennial shortages in education.
"The basic education curriculum should be overhauled to address the learning crisis and reorient it towards the objectives of national industrialization," Quetua said.
Republic Act No. 10533 or the Enhanced Basic Education Act of 2013 introduced an additional two years of high school to secondary education and replaced the previous curriculum with one designed to make students job-ready even in the absence of a college degree.
Vice President Sara Duterte, who is also education secretary, bared in the Department of Education’s first Basic Education Report that several industry partners still hesitate to hire senior high school graduates due to concerns with their skills.
A 2018 PIDS study found that jobs available to senior high school graduates were generally limited to clerical support, crafts and related trades, elementary occupations and other entry-level positions. The study also found most employers were willing to pay senior high graduates only the minimum wage.
Even hiring qualifications in entry-level government positions, as pointed out by Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian in a Senate hearing on improving students’ employability, still lump together senior high graduates with graduates of the 10-year-old high school curriculum.
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