K+12 is pro-poor

The objections to President Noynoy Aquino’s K+12 program continue to be aired by a few, despite the clear finding by SWS that majority of Filipinos support the reform.

What are the two main objections?

The first is that parents now have to add two more years to their education budget. That objection is both correct and incorrect.

It is correct for the approximately 20 percent of Filipinos who manage to go to college. These college students will indeed have to add one or two years to their schooling.

Some will add only one year: these are the ones that enrol in non-Bologna Process majors. Since General Education in college will now be reduced to one year from its current two-year duration, one year will be subtracted from the total number of years for an undergraduate degree.

Right now, these students go through 10 years of basic education and four years of college, for a total of 14 years. With K+12, they will go through 12 years of basic education and three years of college, for a total of 15 years. For them, the K+12 program really means only one more year before getting a baccalaureate degree.

The Bologna Process, however, specifies that certain courses should have at least three years of major subjects. Some of these courses right now have only two years of major subjects. One more year of major subjects, therefore, will be added to these courses. For students enrolled in Bologna-compliant courses, therefore, there will indeed be an additional two years before they graduate from college.

The objection, however, is not correct when we take the case of the 80 percent of Filipinos that do not go to college. These form the bulk of our population, the “masses” or the poor. These 80 percent have little chance of earning a good livelihood, because they lack the employable skills currently available only through post-secondary training or education.

The K+12 program gives the masses a fighting chance to earn good income at no cost to them. In the past, high school graduates among the poor had to pay for post-secondary courses, usually with TESDA or similar institutions. With K+12, the two extra years after Fourth Year High School will be paid for by the government. In other words, the government will now give two more years of free education to the poor to ensure employment. Focus on the word “free.”

Those that object to the K+12 program on the grounds that it means two more years of hardship for parents, therefore, are acting on behalf of the privileged 20 percent that have enough money to go to college. They should start thinking about helping the 80 percent that do not have the means to pay for four years of college education. The K+12 program is designed to give even non-college graduates a chance to earn a decent livelihood. Those with money or those whose children do not go to public schools should not raise a fuss; the program is not for them.

The second common objection is that there is no legal basis for the K+12 program. That is true. Right now, the bill that will make Grades 11 and 12 legal is still in Congress. The Department of Education, however, is not yet offering a free Grade 11 or Grade 12. DepEd is still offering only 10 years of free basic education. DepEd, in other words, is not doing anything illegal.

What DepEd has merely done is to revise the curriculum. Our education authorities revise the curriculum every ten or so years, for the simple reason that a ten-year-old curriculum necessarily is no longer relevant nor effective. DepEd, in fact, is only doing its duty, which is to make the curriculum responsive to the current needs of students and of the country.

Some say that we should not change the name of First Year High School to Grade 7. Renaming is something DepEd can do. No law need be passed to give it the power to change the names of grade levels. What is wrong with the term Grade 7 anyway? That is how several other countries call the grade after Grade 6.

By the way, children in private schools have no reason to worry about the program, for the simple reason that they already spend more than 10 years before they go to college. Many of them have three years of schooling before Grade 1. Some have an extra year in elementary school. There are even private schools that already have Grades 11 and 12. These students in private schools have always had more years of basic education than those in public schools.

What the government is doing is levelling the playing field, so that poor students in public schools will have the same length of basic education as those in private schools. Those that object to the K+12 program should stop protecting the interests of the few and start helping the majority of Filipinos who now welcome two more years of free education.