Of peanuts and monkeys - CHASING THE WIND by Felipe B. Miranda

Every society that has successfully modernized invested enough in developing its human resources, that is to say in educating its people towards civic consciousness, functional literacy, entrepreneurial or competitive productivity, democratic governance and social justice.

Civic consciousness builds a sense of community among people who otherwise would have little more than a selfish identity. Functional literacy goes way beyond simply being able to read and write and emphasizes the need to be able to think rationally, organizedly and, most important, critically. It makes possible the melding of science and the arts in the educated citizenry, minimizing mindless superstition as well as barbaric scientism and facilitating the development of an intellect equally sensitive to truth and beauty.

Entrepreneurial productivity puts a premium on doing well in any competitive setting, in being able to efficiently manage one’s business and its attendant risks in a globalized environment. In this one-world setting, the effective standards for successful competitiveness trivialize national boundaries and allow for no unloading of costly mistakes and overall inefficiency on a politically emasculated citizenry. Most of our so-called entrepreneurs in this country obviously cannot survive in this demanding setting, schooled as most of them are in the cronyism which marry business with politics at the expense of the public interest.

Democratic governance and social justice are characteristic of societies where modern education has taken root and flourished. Given a strong sense of individual worth which is a natural result of an educational process that builds up human capabilities, it is inevitable that the citizenry will increasingly demand meaningful participation in the governance of their community and will exact public accountability from the authorities.

Social justice is the ultimate human attempt at ensuring that life brutalizes no one in modern societies Social Security Systems, safety nets and other schemes to moderate the severeness of modern competitive life are simply the expression of a citizenry’s compassion – not to be confused with charity – for those who for one reason or another do not do well or are unable to do well in their communities.

What has been presented so far is a curriculum for modern education which teachers are ultimately tasked to implement. It is obvious from this curricular description that those who attempt its implementation must come from the best of the citizenry. If modern education is to have any chance of success, the most dedicated and nurturing temperaments, the brightest and most creative minds, the most noble and inspiring souls are precisely those that must be impressed into undertaking and supervising it.

It is interesting that in the past the recruitment of such people had also been difficult but somehow enough of them were found and joined the educational system as teachers. Both the public and the private schools harbored competent and even excellent teachers, and people now in their 50’s and older continue to have fond memories of their dedicated and caring mentors.

Teaching no longer attracts enough of the best and the brightest among Filipinos. While there undoubtedly are exceptions that prove the rule, the best and the brightest generally consider other professions, those that not only provide much better material compensation but also higher social prestige and a correspondingly more elevated sense of self-worth.

Many factors are responsible for the deteriorated status of teaching in this country. Few people are up to the emotional stress occasioned by daily facing up to their students and knowing that they lack everything that makes for decent and inspiring education. Fewer still have the psychological composure to keep insisting on learning lessons that the immediate realities so blatantly refute. (I once came across a teacher teaching hygiene to her young students and all the school’s four toilets were out of order, lacking even water to flush the toilets with. Another time, another teacher was valiantly trying to encourage students to eat a balanced meal but their emaciated look and listless eyes suggested that the only balanced meal they had ever had was precisely the paper poster showing the basic six food groups.)

Of course, there is also the simple matter of teacher’s pay. Unless this is at least immediately doubled in most of the country’s educational institutions, it will be irrational to expect that teachers can live as they should, in comfort but minus luxuries. Their demanding tasks cannot be executed competently and their academic life cannot be lived dedicatedly without decent incomes being assured them and their families. It is the height of irresponsibility to believe that teachers will indefinitely serve an increasingly empty martyrdom.

Nothing is more critical in a nation’s strategy for development than its management of human resources. It is tragic that in developing the Philippines’ primary human resource – the millions of young minds lined up for education – the authorities and our society as a whole had not seen fit to compensate its teachers better. In due time, any society that insists on paying its teachers peanuts gets what it deserves – monkeys for teachers. In due time, what can such misfits do but monkey around with the most precious and most violated resource of this country – your son’s or your daughter’s vulnerably young mind?