DepEd puts off joining study

The Department of Education is holding off its participation to the 2007 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study citing much needed reforms in the country's Math and Science education system.

DepEd officer in charge Fe Hidalgo said the decision came after the Philippines performed poorly in the 2003 study, which showed that out of 45 countries, the Philippines ranked 41st in Math and 42nd in Science skills at the high school level.

"We always ranked third to the last that is why we called off participation to the study to be able to prepare our students for the next TIMSS," Hidalgo said.

TIMSS is a US-based metric system that measures Math and Science capabilities of primary and secondary students, conducted every four years.

TIMSS 2003 also showed that out of 25 countries, the Philippines failed to move from the 23rd rank in Science and Math at the elementary level.

"What we want to do now is to consolidate all our efforts in improving the overall science and math teaching programs so that we will do better in the next TIMSS. Our previous position in the last TIMSS already showed us that we needed so much more improvement," Hidalgo said.

The next Trends in Math and Science study will be scheduled in 2011.

Hidalgo made it clear that the agency had already talked about putting off participation to the TIMSS when former DepEd Secretary Florencio Abad was still in office.

Cebu City Schools Division Superintendent Leonilo Oliva, on the other hand, said that the move is for the benefit of the students saying that this will prepare them for the next study.

"Who knows we might fair well over other countries," Oliva said.

He added that in the latest educators congress they had conducted, they focused more on the three major subjects - Math, Science and English - as they want the students to improve more on the said fields. "We have come up with solutions like training teachers who are not majoring in English, Math and Science but teaching the said subjects. We want them to master the subject so that they will be able to teach the students properly," Oliva said. - Jasmin R. Uy