Public schools need 31,400 new teachers this year

MANILA, Philippines — The public school system is in need of at least 31,400 new teachers this year.

The Department of Education (DepEd) has announced that classes would start on June 3.

In a 43-page report on budget allocation and use, the DepEd has informed the House of Representatives that a total of 193,902 teacher positions have been funded and created under the annual appropriations law from 2016 to 2018.

Of that number, 172,499 or 89 percent have been filled, leaving a balance of 21,403 unfilled positions. Add to these vacancies are 10,000 new teaching posts funded in the 2019 national budget, for which P2.1 billion is allocated.

Several House members, including Mikee Romero of party-list group 1-Pacman, have urged government agencies to recruit job-order, contractual and temporary or end of contract (endo) personnel.

“These employees are as qualified as those who have retired or resigned and whose jobs they have taken over,” Romero said.            

He said many agencies intentionally do not fill vacancies so they could accumulate savings that they could use for other purposes at the end of the fiscal year.

Romero urged officials to spend funds Congress appropriates each year for purposes for which they are intended.

“The government is in the business of rendering service, not saving money,” he added.

Romero also said compensation in government “is comparable, if not better, than the pay the private sector can offer.”

He noted that in public schools, the entry-level monthly basic salary is about P21,000, which he said private schools could hardly match.

The DepEd submitted its report to the House this week. Despite the three-month election-related recess, the House has been conducting oversight hearings on the performance of state agencies.

DepEd’s report showed that the number of students per teacher appears to be improving even if enrollees increased and DepEd failed to recruit the needed number of teachers.

The DepEd reported that more than four million students have been added to enrollment: from 23.9 million in the 2015 to 2016 school year to 27 million in 2018 to 2019.

Based on the report, the teacher-to-learner ratio improved from 1:32 in 2016 to 1:29 in 2018 in the elementary level, from 1:26 to 1:25 during the same period in high school, and from one teacher to 30 students to 1:29 in senior high.

Reelectionist Sen. Sonny Angara said the government should should set a higher minimum pay for teachers if it wants to recruit and retain highly effective educators.

Angara said public school teachers remain among the most underpaid workers in the country given their workload and role in society.

To illustrate this, Angara, who once taught in law school, said that a one-hour class requires three hours of preparation. On top of this, teachers also spend a lot of time learning new content standards, monitoring the progress of their students and planning interventions if necessary.

“Often teachers have to buy their own school supplies and learning materials,” he said.

At present, entry-level public school teachers (Teacher 1), which is equivalent to Salary Grade 11 under Tranche 4 of the Salary Standardization Law (SSL), earn a monthly salary of P20,754. They are, however, exempt from paying personal income tax under the law as they earn less than P250,000 per year. – With Cecille Suerte Felipe, Mayen Jaymalin, Janvic Mateo