The Urgent Need to Improve the Quality of Education in the Philippines: Insights from the PISA Results on Filipino Learners

By: SUZY MAY R. FABULAR

The Programme for International Student Assessment, or PISA, is an international standardized test that measures the academic performance of 15-year-old students in reading, mathematics, and science. The results of PISA have consistently shown that Filipino learners have been among the lowest performers compared to their peers from other participating countries.

In the most recent PISA assessment in 2018, the Philippines ranked 78th out of 79 countries in mathematics, 77th in science, and 55th in reading. These results indicate a significant gap between the performance of Filipino students and those from other countries, and underscore the need for urgent action to improve the quality of education in the Philippines.

One possible reason for the low performance of Filipino learners is the lack of access to high-quality education. Many schools in the Philippines are underfunded and lack basic resources, such as textbooks, laboratory equipment, and technology. Additionally, many teachers are undertrained and lack the necessary skills to effectively teach their subjects.

Another possible reason is the lack of emphasis on critical thinking and problemsolving skills in the education system. Many schools in the Philippines still rely on traditional teaching methods that focus on memorization and rote learning, rather than on developing the analytical and problem-solving skills that are necessary for success in the modern world.

To address these challenges, there is a need for a comprehensive and coordinated effort by the government, educators, and other stakeholders to improve the quality of education in the Philippines. This may involve increasing funding for education, providing more resources and support to schools and teachers, and investing in technology to enhance learning and teaching.

Rodriguez for filing House Resolution # 8677, an Act declaring May 12th every year as a special nonworking public holiday to be known as Cagayan de Oro Liberation Day.”

“We also thank our City and Provincial Officials and all our donors and supporters for their efforts and kindness to ensure that our local guerrillas are appropriately recognized and memorialized.”

“It is our hope that through these memorials and exhibits, the younger generation may learn about the sacrifices of our local guerrillas and how it paved the way to the very freedoms they now enjoy.”

“ I’m reminded of the words of the late Vice President Salvador Laurel who once said “ A nation is only as strong or as weak as the memory of its people as to who they are, where they came from, and what their forebears stood for and fought for”.

“We hope that these memorials and exhibits will remind us of our valiant past in preserving our freedoms, our culture, and our identity. The very freedoms we can all be very proud of.”

Sky...

from page 4 implies exclusions and are based on violence, Instead of a culture of abundance, profit-driven globalization creates cultures of exclusion, dispossession and scarcity. In fact, globalization transformation of all beings and resources into commodities robs diverse species and people of their rightful share of ecological, cultural, economic, and political space. The ownership” of the rich is based on the “dispossession” of the poor – it is the common, public resources of the poor which are privatized, and the poor who are disowned economically, politically and culturally.”

If, at all, we have to own these essentials, i.e., land, forest, water, etc. it must follow the moral tenet that the users should be the owners. Our lumads had “owned” the forest for hundreds, if not, thousands of years, and have used them sustainably with high reverence to nature. But the 17 million hectares of dipterocarp forests which were the homes then of billions of flora and fauna are now gone, gone to loggers everyone who used their massive rakings to become powerful politicians. Then the neo-colonizers came, the TNCs in cohort with powers-that-be, illegally grabbing the lands of the Indigenous Peoples and transforming our choicest of lands into massive plantations, using toxic chemicals heavily that as if we are dumping to our watersheds some 2,000 dump trucks of poisons every day as seven out of eight chemicals are already banned in other countries. Are you still wondering why so many of newly-born babies are deformed or why many are now dying of cancer? Yes, our agricultural lands, when not owned by the communities, are subjected to tremendous amount of poisonous chemicals which have destroyed their natural fertility.

This is also true to electricity. The so-called electric cooperatives must reckon with the fact that the member-consumers are really the owners because of their monthly payment of two items: 1) amortization of loans and 2) reinvestment. These items when computed will reach tens of thousands of pesos per member-consumer, yet no patronage credits were issued to them.

It has become imperative for all of us to rectify social wrongs which are being inflicted upon the people. Following the principle of transparency and accountability, the people have the right to know. Why have we lost our ecological integrity which is now causing horrible environmental disasters? Who were those who have amassed so much from selling the bounty of the forests?

All told, we have to question the dominant development paradigm that subject everything, including those which are means to life, to the commerce of men or women and even to greed, moderate or otherwise, Just like the Indian Chief Seattle, we have to start asking questions, poetically or otherwise. So much social injustice looming that has put our humanity is disarray. For the cooperatives, it has become imperative to act on our mandate which is concretely and categorically stated in Chapter 15, Article 12 of the 1987 Constitution: “To promote the viability and growth of cooperatives as instruments of social justice, equity and economic development.”