GEC starts early

There is a provision in the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) Memorandum Order No. 20, series of 2013, that opens the door for Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to start offering the new General Education Curriculum (GEC) in June 2014.

Section 2 (“Provision for Transition in Some Private Basic Education Schools”) of Article 2 (“Transitory Provisions”) states: “In light of the transition models implemented by some basic education schools where they re-label the grades, such that students will graduate as early as 2016, the new GE shall be implemented earlier than 2018.”

The provision refers to the modelling process that the Department of Education (DepEd) started in 2012. There were several schools that started Grade 11 in June of that year. The students in Grade 11 then are now in Grade 12. In March 2014, these students will be graduates of Grade 12.

There were also schools that calibrated their grade levels in 2012. (“Calibrate” is a more precise term than “re-label.”) These schools offered 12 years of pre-university education even before the government implemented the K to 12 program. Typically, such schools had two or three years of schooling before Grade 1 and a Grade 7 squeezed between elementary and high school. When K to 12 was adopted, these schools realigned their curriculum to fit the new scheme. Their Fourth Year students consequently became Grade 12 students.

There are also schools (which may or may not be model or calibrated schools) that already achieve the minimum learning competencies or standards that DepEd is now requiring for Senior High School. These schools may not have formally had Grade 12, but their Fourth Year graduates are as good as future Grade 12 graduates.

There are also schools whose high school graduates already meet the College Readiness Standards demanded by CHED of students entering college after 12 years of basic education.

In short, there are a number of students that are, in effect, graduates of K to 12 even if DepEd will graduate Grade 12 students only in 2018.

When these de facto K to 12 students enter college in June 2014, they will be wasting their time going through the old (and still current) GEC. Most of the competencies, standards, or outcomes in the old GEC are covered by the K to 12 curriculum.

Take, for example, the University of Makati. The thousands of students now in Grade 12 there will be going to college in June 2014. In their model curriculum, they brought down to Senior High School most of the old GEC subjects. To require these students to repeat English, Filipino, Math, Sciences, Social Sciences, Rizal, NSTP, PE, etc., is to defeat the purpose not only of the modelling but of the K to 12 curriculum itself.

Private HEIs with calibrated basic education departments will also face the problem of their own high school graduates entering their own college departments. If they use the old GEC, their students will have exactly the same subjects with exactly the same teachers for the next two years.

What this all means is that the preparations for the new GEC have to be accelerated. CMO 20 mandates (in Section 1 of the same Article) that, “prior to the entry of the first batch of Grade 12 students to college in AY 2018-2019, higher education institutions with higher education development assistance of CHED shall prepare the basic requirements in the implementation of the revised GE curriculum as follows:

“Orientation and training of GE faculty so as to (i) orient them toward the philosophy of liberal education, away from the disciplinal and remedial thrust of current GE courses; (ii) enable them to teach the core courses using new material; and (iii) recognize best practices in general education;

“Design of new, interesting, challenging elective courses that satisfy the GE criteria, including the emphasis on competence-based outcomes;

“Development of up-to-date and appropriate course syllabi, readings, materials and resources; and

“Development of a monitoring and assessment system of GE programs as implemented by the various departments or colleges and universities, including a provision for the regular review of the GE program.”

Preparing for the new GEC is not the responsibility of the model high schools. These model high schools simply followed the recommendation of the Steering Committee of the K to 12 reform program to try out various modes of delivering Senior High School. Ensuring that graduates of these model high schools will not be forced to repeat their two years in Grades 11 and 12 is the responsibility of CHED, or failing government action, of the HEIs that will accept them.

There is a lot to be done – and done quickly. Since the Steering Committee ceased to exist with the promulgation of the K to 12 Law and Implementing Rules and Regulations, DepEd and CHED will now have to go their separate ways in fulfilling the objectives of the K to 12 reform. DepEd is working to flesh out the details of the K to 12 curriculum. CHED must now ensure that concerned HEIs (there are only a few of them affected by the modelling or recalibration programs anyway) are ready to implement the new GEC by June 2014.