The State of Education: A Closer Look into Philippine Basic Education and the Department of Education’s High School Bridge Program

Abstract

Education is an irreplaceable and integral part of development, where development denotes both growth and change. Change in turn includes aspects that are social, cultural and economic in nature, as well as qualitative and quantitative in scope (UN Decade Report, 1960). In this line, it is necessary to arrest the drift of the quality of Philippine education towards obsolescence. The researcher chose to assess the dynamics of the education system and the factors that have contributed to its decline. In doing so, the researcher gathered data from countless sources in the internet and scoured different libraries in search of books that may help in the conduct of this study. In addition, to secure data from credible sources, the researcher has conducted key informant interviews from the education sector and the Senate of the Republic of the Philippines. This study goes with the assumption that the state and quality of the Philippine education system is indeed deteriorating. The study focuses on basic education and the efforts of the Department of Education to address its problem. The researcher particularly chose the High School Bridge Program because of the socio-economic factors that need to be considered in its implementation. The study was not done simply to outline the problems that the Philippine education system is facing. After careful analysis of data the researcher sought to provide recommendations and possible alternatives that may be applied and implemented instead of the Department of Education’s High School Bridge Program. In the end, the researcher found out that the problems in Philippine education go beyond the shortages in schools, classrooms, textbooks, and teachers. It also includes socio-economic factors such as the disparity among the social classes. In this line, the researcher concluded that the High School Bridge program is not a sufficient address to the problems of basic education. Instead of the implementation of the High School Bridge Program, the researcher suggested that the Department of Education should lobby for more funds from the national government; it should strengthen its teacher training programs; make the textbook-making process more accurate; ensure efficiency in its operations by decentralization; and encourage a multi-sector cooperation among all the stakeholders of the educational system.