President Estrada pledges support for education - Roses And Thorns byAlejandro R. Roces

Last Friday, President Estrada vowed that his administration would give unwavering support for major education projects that seek to elevate the country's public education system to a competitive world-class standard. This pledge was given after the inauguration of the P10.5-million division office of the Department of Education, Culture and Sports in San Jose, Antique, a project that is part of the P16.9-billion Third Elementary Education Project (TEEP). What is commendable about the TEEP is that it is a multiproject program for the country's 22 poorest provinces. If their plans materialize, TEEP will construct 9,000 new school rooms and repair 3,000. The 22 poorest provinces will also each get a new division office. So, it is an implementation of the President's "Erap Para Sa Mahirap" program. We take this occasion to thank the two multilateral funding institutions -- the World Bank and the Japan-based Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund.

The new millennium is going to be the Era of Education. Education Secretary Andrew Gonzalez was right when he said that the government expects much from its citizens but invests little in their education. He cited the example of Thailand that spends seven times more than we do for the education of the individual student.

A few days ago, the Philippine Human Development Report (PHDR) gave some statistics on what the government has to provide. The country's high 2.3 percent population growth rate means that the administration will have to provide school provisions for up to half a million new students annually in elementary education alone. To aggravate matters, household financing for education rose to close to 50 percent in just three years.

Filipino families value education. Next to food, it has top priority. They know that it is the best endowment they can give their children. Property, they can lose. Education stays with them forever and it gives their children the opportunity to compete in an increasing competitive job market. Our economic decline started when, under Dictator Marcos, the government shifted its emphasis from education to the military. Somehow, this policy continued even after EDSA. Last year, the Education Department needed 16,969 new elementary and high school teachers. But their budget was for only 7,209 teachers. So there was a nationwide shortage of 9,760 teachers in elementary and high schools. We also need new 24,881 classrooms. But the budget is only good for 10,266. So we will lack 14,615 classrooms. Textbooks are as big a problem. Students don't have their individual books. They have to share them with their classmates.

Education is not the main solution to our problems. It is the indispensible answer to all our problems. Yet, the latest budget report says that Congress intends to cut the P2.5-billion school- building budget of the DECS. This means that 50,000 public school students will get their education in open fields. As for teachers, the further cut on the DECS budget would mean that only 5,000 instead of the needed 10,000 new teachers will be hired.