EDITORIAL - No Gr. I and II science subjects in K+12

What most people object to in the K+12 program that the Department of Education insists on ramming down the throats of Filipino parents and students is the additional two years of high school, which it calls senior high, and which must be taken by anyone wanting to go to college.

That is because this is the only thing they know about the K+12 — the additional two years of high school. They do not know if there are other onerous provisions of this impractical and ill-timed program. 

Well dear parents and students, there are more. Listen to this one and see if you will agree: Under the K+12 program which the DepEd insists on implementing beginning this school year, there will be no more science subjects in Grades I and II.

Yes, that is right, the K+12 program will scrap the science subjects for the first two grades in the elementary level. Whatever the government hopes to achieve with the K+12 program, it certainly is doing everything to achieve the opposite.

And that is why the government ought to abandon the K+12 program before it is too late and causes irreparable damage. It is not only ill-timed and impractical, it is also misguided and contradictory.

Listen: President Aquino says with K+12, students need not even go to college because by the time they complete high school, they will be ready for jobs. But doesn’t that contradict the original aim of achieving parity with the rest of the world?

Aquino and DepEd’s Armin Luistro both say the Philippines is the only country left in the world with a 10-year basic education curriculum, hence the need to make it 12. So how come Aquino is saying students can drop out after high school because they will be ready for jobs by then?

The problem with parents is that they are just grumbling among themselves. The onerous K+12 program will not be stopped if they limit their disagreement to just grumbling. They need to take more positive action to let the government know they oppose the plan.

They can pressure their congressmen and their senators, as well as local officials to take a firmer stand against this worthless and unwarranted imposition. Can you imagine no science subjects in Grade I and Grade II? What kind of a program for betterment is that?