Education: Faded Glory, my 2 cents

The Philippine Star published today an opinion column from Ms. Ana Marie Pamintuan entitled "Faded glory", where here she notes that there is a decline in the quality of Philippine Education, given the latest international rankings where not one Philippine University made it to the rankings. Even in a recent Asian universities ranking, we did not make it as well.

As stated in her column, people have questioned the methodologies of the Times Higher Education survey (THE) and the London-based education and career company Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), claiming that there are factual errors in both groups' studies. 

But no matter what critics say, I agree with Ms. Pamintuan on the fact that we have been left behind by our Asian neighbors. I'd say this is thanks to the lack of concern by our government and this is an insult at the same time, because we used to be on the forefront as a regional learning center. Di ka ba maiinis when those who trailed you before are now the ones whom you are trying to catch up with?

Thanks to our government in issuing budget cuts, we have experienced an all time low in education standards. As a UPM Bio student, I can attest to that. Our lack of facilities force us to exercise resourcefulness, and more often than not, we resort to theoretical data in most of our experiments because of the lack of materials and equipment. 

Let us not forget the high rising costs of tuition fees. Education HAS NOW BECOME A LUXURY AND NOT A RIGHT for most of our fellow Filipinos. For God's sake, do you all know how unfair that is? IT IS AN OUTRIGHT SUPPRESSION OF ONE'S RIGHT TO EDUCATION!

Edukasyon ay karapatan ng mamamayan!

But that is only from my POV as a student. How about the teachers? First off, they are already underpaid and overworked, and as a result most of them are leaving the country, shifting to a course that is "of the rage" now (at the moment, Culinary Arts seem to be it) and getting themselves employed overseas where they get paid more than what they get from their original profession. 

This is the sad truth, yet the government is proud to have OFWs because they can render service and foreign dollars into our economy, but then, are we going to be OFWs forever? Can't we actually generate jobs which can have a strong impact on our economy? Can't we raise the salaries of teachers and all our laborers? Don't you think it is unfair that OFWs have to face the possibility of suffering overseas due to illegal recruiters and abusive employers? 

I am not saying that the OFWs have not done anything for the country. As I stated earlier, they do bring in foreign currencies to our economy and are vital to the structure. However, given that most of them suffer overseas without compensation and such, it is as if we are sending OFWs abroad as slaves. Sorry for the harsh term, but YES, SOMETIMES this happens... and our government usually fails to prevent this...

Back to the issue at hand, if the government does not do something right now to try to improve the quality of our education, then, as Ms. Pamintuan said, we are only going to be left with recollections of our past glory. Where, in the past we were in the front lines of education, today, we are sinking way, way below.

Another wake up call, Mr. President. Stop Noynoying.

/no1

Original article from Philippine Star, by Ana Marie Pamintuan. Opinion here all mine; Just my 2 cents here.