PRESS RELEASE October 7, 2010 Contact Person: Fidel H. Fababier, Secretary General Contact No. 09237156009/ FB Account- Assert Teachers “ What educators say about PNoy’s First 100 days” PNOY’S EDUCATION REFORMS: NOTHING NEW, JUST A REHASH OF THE OLD TO FURTHER COMMODIFY EDUCATION! This is what the Action and Solidarity for the Empowerment of Teachers (ASSERT) say of PNoy’s education reform program as the President wrapped- up his first 100 days in office. The 32,000 –strong national organization of teachers said that so much has been said about K+ 12 or the plan to introduce kindergarten and add two more years to the present ten-year public basic education cycle. “ Nothing is clear, however, where the plan is taking us to in the light of our people’s aspiration for a self-reliant and sustainable economy that rely heavily on the full development of the country’s natural and human potential”, said James Pagaduan, ASSERT National President. K+12 is PNoy’s centerpiece program to address the twin problem of deteriorating quality of Philippine education and the alarming number of school children dropping out of school every year, with grades 1 to 3 being the hardest hit. As in the past administrations, the plan will have to rely less and less on government funding and more and more on the private sector for support under the voluntary and institutionalized system of public-private partnership that the President advocated in his inaugural speech. “Private sector supporting public education is not a bad thing, government’s deliberately abandoning its moral and constitutional duty of providing free and relevant education to its citizens is”, clarified Pagaduan Pagaduan expressed alarm in particular, over what he sees as the increasing role given the private sector in policy review and reorientation, planning, monitoring and evaluating DepEd program and projects. T5hese programs and projects, Pagaduan elaborated, include review and revision of curriculum, writing, production and distribution of textbooks, teachers’ recruitment, scholarships and training, procurement, staff appraisal, etc. Instead of allocating the highest priority to education as mandated by the 1987 Philippine Constitution, Pagaduan lamented, government choose to follow the impositions of World Bank and other foreign lending institutions to cut public expenditures in exchanged for new loans and foreign assistance. The undue advantage given private sector has, according to Pagaduan, de- emphasized social science as a course and subject in both basic and higher education curricula, marginalized teachers’ cooperatives and other well- meaning education service providers among NGOs and POs and promoted crash commercialism and consumerism among school children. He also lamented how, easily representatives of the big business, banking and corporate sectors get elected to Congress, chair important committees and sit in the governing boards of state colleges and universities to influence policy and legislations that favor corporate greed for profit.#
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