The Philippines' Decades-Long OUTDATED Education System
As a child born in the 1980s, I would say I was born during the Marcos Years and I was about a year old when the EDSA Revolution happened. That means I've passed through a lot of stuff rendered obsolete today such as dial-up Internet (which my parents refused to get due to how it interrupted the phone lines unlike the Digital Subscriber Line), cassette players, VHS players, and may I mention the education system. It might be fun to think of times when people of my age group watched The Flintstones or The Flintstone Kids (picture above) during the 1990s imagining school during the stone age. However, these photos today may make me cringe to think about how I grew up in an outdated education system.
My recollection of the outdated education system in my eyes from the 1990s before K+12 got implemented
My current readings through the book From Third World to First by the late Lee Kuan Yew made me want to write this. The recent chapters I'm in are "Deng Xiaoping's China" and "China Beyond Beijing". I decided to take a pause because I could write about what Lee Kuan Yew observed when he was with Deng. Deng was pretty much an old man when he ruled China after Zhou Enlai died. What was revealed on Pages 618-619 are as follows about the education system:
Our visit to the university in Wuhan, one of China's major industrial cities along the Yangtze River, was a saddening experience. Some of the professors we met were American-educated. Although advanced in age and their English rusty, they were obviously men of erudition and quality. In the library, Ling, then a medical student, spoke to a young man who was recording an English-language biology textbook. She asked to see it and found out it was printed in the 1950s. She was incredulous. How could they be reading a biology textbook 30 years out of date? But they have been shut off for more than 30 years; having just opened up to the West, they had no foreign exchange to buy textbooks and journals. And they had no photocopying machine. It would take a long time closing the knowledge gap that had widened between them and the developed world. The Cultural Revolution had set them back by a whole generation. The present students, recovering from the Cultural Revolution, were taught with outdated textbooks by teachers using outmoded teaching methods and without audiovisual aids. This would be another semilost generation. True, the most brilliant of them would make it regardless of the disadvantages. But an industrial society requires a well-educated total population, not just a brilliant few.
This reminds me of how much most schools in the Philippines are outdated. I'm not saying schools need to have air conditioners and elevators. What I'm saying is that if tuition fees should raise--it's because of updating the facilities, salaries, and education system to fit in with the times. I could talk about a few absolute idiocies that I observed for a such time such as:
- Still having computer monitors in black and white when colored monitors should be better.
- Typing lessons still used a typewriter. Thankfully, that paper-eating monster was junked because the desktop has been the most convenient tool for writing reports today. Yet, many people passed through that monster that had to be thrown out!
- Schools that were still using dial-up Internet cards because they were "cheaper" in contrast to the DSL. This will slow up work in the long run.
- Teachers made the term paper a "pure textbook research". Pure "Internet research" isn't research but the Internet is a tool that can help you find books in your local library. I remembered how I was gaping in ignorance when I saw the libraries of the University of San Carlos-Main Campus and later the Talamban Campus. It was a far cry from the high school libraries.
I could talk about how I was left ignorant of the whole benefits of K+12. Most people felt K+12 was a burden to parents. However, what they didn't is that K+12 countries have that benefit. There are six years of grade school, three years of middle school, and three years of high school. Now, I could remember everything wrong with the education system. I guess that's why I did stupid stuff that children do when their grades are low like forged cards, and not showing the report cards to parents. etc. I guess it's because we value grades way too much. I think long summer vacations are good on paper but they also force the subject matter to be force-fed as quick as possible. It's like trying to eat an entire roasted calf all in one day for a hyperbolic comparison.
Here are some issues with K+10 education which I might point out:
- There's an over-focus on rote memorization. Memorization of facts is part of learning. I wouldn't be able to write fluently without some facts memorized. However, too much focus on rote memorization is making robots instead of humans out of students.
- The way mathematics and sciences are taught barely shows how they're part of life. What's the use of being introduced to all second-year high school algebra, third-year geometry, and fourth-year trigonometry and calculus if students don't see its relevance? The problem is how these look "useless" since not everyone will be finding the missing measurements or solving for derivatives? I feel so stupid that I only knew calculus life application taking my business administration course. I felt I only knew trigonometry's application only when I took the subject (again) in college and nearly failed it during my Associate in Computer Science days. I barely passed it!
- Need I mention how economics is only taught in fourth-year high school? The subject may be taught a year long but it felt like a last-minute thing.
- Chinese schools tend to focus on too many long texts for the exams rather than on learning how to speak the language. I think it's a major problem some people have finished Chinese education (I only have Grade Six but failed in the Zhuyin subject which I believe needs to be replaced with the pinyin). Some can't even talk Mandarin properly! What's the use of teaching another language for going abroad if they can't speak it?
The examples I just gave would lead to the consequences of viewing school as a burden than a delight. I remembered how often I ended up hating school, how often I wrote the poem that ended with the statement "Teacher's dirty looks". I could talk about the mental exhaustion of having to burn the midnight candle. I used to think I improved myself when I spent countless nights awake to finish my term paper while my grades were slipping. As a person struggling with attention deficit disorder--I felt that it was really tiring. I studied but I still failed. I felt I was torturing myself so I took the "escape route" to just play computer games and end up in long-winded fights with my parents. I told them how easy high school was but again--wasn't it because information during their time was sparse in contrast to today? I think the bigger problem, as Lee pointed out, is the usage of outdated teaching methods. Sure, we may have the latest textbooks today but the teaching methods need to change as well.
How an outdated education system really hindered the Philippines' progress for decades
The long-term consequences aren't pretty either. I decided to think about the consequences of decades of outdated education:
- The focus on rote memorization made a lot of students like the scholars in the Indian myth The Scholars and the Lion. The story had three scholars that foolishly resurrected the dead lion to their demise. Sadly, a lot of students go into the world devoid of common sense discouraging people from studying and getting good grades. Some people just throw everything out of the window when they graduate. I feel that's why a lot of people in the Philippines tend to lose their common sense even after graduating from prestigious schools.
- I remembered how I actually hated many of my high school lessons. I often argued way too often about how lessons are getting harder. The big issue is how often maths and sciences are made into just a requirement by the Department of Education (DepEd). I remembered not doing well in those subjects while wanting to take a Bachelor of Science in Information Technology (BSIT) where I rode the bandwagon. Later, many people left the course to pursue commerce-related courses. I feel so stupid how I only knew maths and sciences as relevant knowledge only after I said, "I wouldn't need them in the office." It's like how I appreciate good cooking because of chemistry and physics. I ended up appreciating the layout of IT Park because of trigonometry. Now, why aren't students taught these subjects are part of life and not just a requirement to pass?
- Teaching economics only as a "last-minute subject" has created students who can't understand economics as part of life. I may have gotten better grades in economics in college and graduate school. However, I still feel so stupid today that I didn't see its importance only until college. Sadly, some people may not be even taking economics subjects back in college but they only had a very faint glimpse of it. Making it just another requirement to pass has caused more backward thinking.
Students need to study subjects such as mathematics, sciences, history, and economics because they're all learning the facts. Businesses are built on several schools of knowledge. The IT Park in Salinas Lahug is built on maths and sciences. Mathematics is extensively used in the foundations of technological advancements. Mathematics is part of scientific analysis after all. Sadly, it's not easily observed until people reach college and take the wrong course for them like how I wanted to take BSIT just to look impressive. Economics is no different since it's also part of life. However, a poorly educated population has resulted in backward thinking.
Back in when I was still in elementary, I foolishly said, "If I were president, I will make sure all prices drop low." It's a good thing that I'm not president right now or I sticking with that knowledge. I can imagine if I were president right now and I demanded all people to sell at a loss. The war in Ukraine has triggered the supply of gasoline to drop low hence prices go high. It's easily understandable if elementary students don't understand economics. However, it becomes a problem with economics is just a required subject to pass or be taught like it was very last-minute. Sadly, so many comments that I've read on Facebook are totally evidence of such ignorance. That's why they believe in the propaganda of people like Bayan Muna, League of Filipino Students, IBON Foundation, and Kabataan Partylist. They have believed in economically unfeasible demands such as lowering the prices of goods while increasing wages and giving extremely huge government handouts. They're all part of spending and not an inflow.
Just reading the ignorant comments on Facebook pages about foreign investments is just proof of that. Comments regarding President Rodrigo R. Duterte's signage of the Public Services Act of 2022 are just one. Similar comments also happened during the late Benigno Simeon C. Aquino's rule when he invited other foreign investors after making some economic reforms. History, for example, tells us how nations progressed by trading. New technology was introduced even while the natives of pre-colonial Philippines traded with various merchants such as the Chinese, Indians, and Arabs. New technology got introduced when the Philippines was colonized by Spain, Japan, and the United States. If not, the Philippines would've been left at the stone age. Some people still have their economic ignorance which I think is also carried because they lack historical knowledge of the sciences. The Philippines didn't get all its technology overnight or on its own. The Philippines got its technology introduced by foreigners.
It's amazing how Lee Kuan Yew already dismissed the idea of MNCs as "exploiters". Kishore Mahbubani, the former dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (and a United Nations diplomat) had emphasized how foreign investments will teach new things and create jobs. Singapore's education system has decided to do with new methods that brought the nation forward. Lee Hsien Loong wouldn't be able to enjoy the benefits of a good Singapore if the population remained dull. In fact, I think I'm going to recommend the Singaporean way of education to fix the Philippines. Making it more of cooperation within the school than a competition among students to get an "A". I guess that's why I felt like homeschooling and Montessori might be best for some instead of a one-size-fits-all approach. Lee Kuan Yew even said so himself that if they waited for Singapore to "be better"--they would've starved from the book, From Third World to First.
What I wrote in my Asian History essay during the fourth-grading exam didn't deserve the high grade it had. I said, "I will make sure to have a well-disciplined population." What I didn't realize back then are these important observations while I kept mentioning Singapore in that essay:
- Disciplining the poor is almost impossible. Some people have to work extra-long hours or even have multiple jobs. It's not just one parent but sometimes both parents because they need all that money to raise their children. Their ignorance about investments makes them even think that they should use their children to take care of them financially instead of enjoying retirement savings. People can only learn an honest living if there were better job opportunities available.
- Singapore in itself isn't just rich because of its disciplinarian environment. It's also because Singapore is a country that has a very productive free-market thanks to competition between Singaporeans and foreign investments. If Singapore didn't open its door to multinational corporations (MNCs) then I wouldn't be able to salute Jollibee and other Filipino MNCs doing business there.
- Money is needed when you're cleaning up the country. Money in itself isn't evil per see but greed for it is. Money will be needed to pay a good workforce to do cleaning up the river. Lee Kuan Yew also emphasized in his book From Third World to First that greening up Singapore was no easy task.
- Not everyone can afford a private school. Public schools are funded by taxpayers. It would require tremendous amounts of taxes to upgrade public schools to first-class quality like in Singapore and Finland. It would mean that there should be more MNCs to produce more jobs. If there will be more taxpayers then public schools can be adequately funded and have more or less the same standard as a public school. Even public schools may soon have more adjustable modes of learning like in Singapore.
The cycle goes on that the Philippines' long outdated education system is nearly comparable to Deng's takeover. Deng's fixes such as allowing MNCs to compete against the local Chinese businessmen changed everything. Foreign investors create jobs, teach new skills, and bring in new technology. That's what Singapore proved against the third world countries, some still remain third world countries, because they stuck with the loser mindset that MNCs are plunderers who will rape their resources. Singapore knew the power that MNCs brought in such as when the late Albert Winsemius, a Dutch economist, proved to its "development economists" that they do need foreign investments to further develop. It's because the world is now a global village whether we want to admit it or not.
What the Philippines can learn from Singapore's education system
It would be good to emulate Singapore. I'm getting tired of people who keep saying bad things about Singapore. I would like to say that the Philippines can become like Singapore in some way. It would be good to think about how Singapore doesn't only use K+12 (which will allow various subjects to be learned in middle school and high school--such as economics) but how it's also done.
An interesting read I have from The Conversation is on the successful Singaporean education system. I would like to give an excerpt from the article based on its instructional regime and the logic of teaching in Singapore:
Singapore’s instructional regime
In general, classroom instruction in Singapore is highly-scripted and uniform across all levels and subjects. Teaching is coherent, fit-for-purpose and pragmatic, drawing on a range of pedagogical traditions, both Eastern and Western.As such, teaching in Singapore primarily focuses on coverage of the curriculum, the transmission of factual and procedural knowledge, and preparing students for end-of-semester and national high stakes examinations.And because they do, teachers rely heavily on textbooks, worksheets, worked examples and lots of drill and practice. They also strongly emphasise mastery of specific procedures and the ability to represent problems clearly, especially in mathematics. Classroom talk is teacher-dominated and generally avoids extended discussion.Intriguingly, Singaporean teachers only make limited use of “high leverage” or unusually effective teaching practices that contemporary educational research (at least in the West) regards as critical to the development of conceptual understanding and “learning how to learn”.For example, teachers only make limited use of checking a student’s prior knowledge or communicating learning goals and achievement standards. In addition, while teachers monitor student learning and provide feedback and learning support to students, they largely do so in ways that focus on whether or not students know the right answer, rather than on their level of understanding.So Singapore’s teaching regime is one primarily focused on the transmission of conventional curriculum knowledge and examination performance. And clearly it is highly-effective, helping to generate outstanding results in international assessments Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).The logic of teaching in SingaporeSingapore’s education system is the product of a distinctive, even unique, set of historical, institutional and cultural influences. These factors go a long way to help explain why the educational system is especially effective in the current assessment environment, but it also limits how transferable it is to other countries.Over time, Singapore has developed a powerful set of institutional arrangements that shape its instructional regime. Singapore has developed an education system which is centralised (despite significant decentralisation of authority in recent years), integrated, coherent and well-funded. It is also relatively flexible and expert-led.In addition, Singapore’s institutional arrangements is characterised by a prescribed national curriculum. National high stakes examinations at the end of primary and secondary schooling stream students according to their exam performance and, crucially, prompt teachers to emphasise coverage of the curriculum and teaching to the test. The alignment of curriculum, assessment and instruction is exceptionally strong.Beyond this, the institutional environment incorporates top-down forms of teacher accountability based on student performance (although this is changing), that reinforces curriculum coverage and teaching to the test. Major government commitments to educational research (£109m between 2003-2017) and knowledge management are designed to support evidence-based policy making. Finally, Singapore is strongly committed to capacity building at all levels of the system, especially the selection, training and professional development of principals and teachers.Singapore’s instructional regime and institutional arrangements are also supported by a range of cultural orientations that underwrites, sanctions and reproduces the instructional regime. At the most general level, these include a broad commitment to a nation-building narrative of meritocratic achievement and social stratification, ethnic pluralism, collective values and social cohesion, a strong, activist state and economic growth.In addition, parents, students, teachers and policy makers share a highly positive but rigorously instrumentalist view of the value of education at the individual level. Students are generally compliant and classrooms orderly.Importantly, teachers also broadly share an authoritative vernacular or “folk pedagogy” that shapes understandings across the system regarding the nature of teaching and learning. These include that “teaching is talking and learning is listening”, authority is “hierarchical and bureaucratic”, assessment is “summative”, knowledge is “factual and procedural,” and classroom talk is teacher-dominated and “performative”.Clearly, Singapore’s unique configuration of historical experience, instruction, institutional arrangements and cultural beliefs has produced an exceptionally effective and successful system. But its uniqueness also renders its portability limited. But there is much that other jurisdictions can learn about the limits and possibilities of their own systems from an extended interrogation of the Singapore model.At the same time it is also important to recognise that the Singapore model is not without its limits. It generates a range of substantial opportunity costs, and it constrains (without preventing) the capacity of the system for substantial and sustainable reform. Other systems, contemplating borrowing from Singapore, would do well to keep these in mind.
There should be some modifications since the Philippines has 7,107 islands divided into 17 regions. I want to create a more developed Philippines through economic reform. This economic reform will bring in badly needed revenues which will bring in taxes. Government funding is used in public schools. MNCs can be part of the whole scheme to improve the public school system to have better facilities. There will be both private schools and public schools for the different classes. Public schools will get better funding when there are more investments. Both public schools and private schools can now benefit from technological advancements brought by MNCs. It would do well to have the Philippines upgrade its education system for better business and economics.
References
Books
"From Third World to First--The Singapore Story: 1965-2000) by Lee Kuan Yew
Harpers Collins Publishers
Websites
"Why is Singapore’s school system so successful, and is it a model for the West?" by Jo Adetunji
Editor, The Conversation UK, (February 11, 2014 2.49pm GMT)
