This week, a report rocked this island-republic again.
The other report did not so much shock us as surprised us that it is the same problem that has plagued the populace for a hundred years, beginning from the 1900s when the Americans introduced modern pedagogy. Attributed to the World Bank, the documents indicated how poor we are in so many aspects of educating our children.
The report was culled and collated from tests the Philippines took part in several global initiatives: the Program for International Student Assessment (Pisa), which the Philippines joined for the first time in 2018; the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) in 2019, the Southeast Asia Primary Learning Metrics (SEA-PLM) in 2019. The country joined PISA for the first time then; the Philippines rejoined TIMSS after a long break of some 16 years; and it was our first cycle for the SEA-PLM in 2019. This was clear in the report.
Under Pisa, the knowledge and skills of 15-year-old students were assessed in the domain of reading, mathematics, and science. The students from Grade 4 to 8 were the subject of TIMSS, which looked into proficiency in mathematics and science. Reading and writing as well as literacy in mathematics was done in SEA-PLM with Grade 5 students as target.
The results were dismal. Reading and skills in mathematics were low, among many other inefficiencies.
In tests such as those mentioned, there are minimum levels of proficiency marked as indicators. The Philippine student sample showed more than 80 percent falling below these levels. Compared to other students in other countries, the Philippines was down there, miserably last or clustered with poor achievers.
Old issue this may be, but still compelling is the observation how the English language and our students’ lack of proficiency in it contributed significantly to the below-standard performance in mathematics and science.
Following the World Bank report, the language of instruction was responsible for the underachievement of education in the country.
Summarized, the report cogently stated thus: our children do not know what they should know in school.
As if those factors articulated are not sad enough, the reports mentioned other factors contributing to the problems encountered by the students in the country. These are bullying and the health conditions that plague them.
The tragic factor, however, that is not mentioned in the report is the fact of the persistence and perpetuity of those conditions underscored. Give and take some shifts in statistics, the report is “old”. The contents of the reports are no more divulged than disclosed and assured. We know them. They have been with us.
The good educator is not expected to celebrate upon receiving the summary of the collated reports. The good educator should proceed from there. By this time, however, the educators of this country know already about the response of the top educator herself, the Secretary of Education. She has demanded an apology from World Bank for shaming the nation by disclosing a report without informing the Department first. There is also the issue that the data are old.
The impact of the report on the Department of Education, as perceived by its Secretary, was so great the Office had to issue an official rejoinder. In this letter, the following paragraphs appear:
“The use of 2019 old PISA data was admitted by the Senior Economist of the World Bank in a note to an Undersecretary of Education, thus: “Please know that the full report contents are derived from published PISA scores and I hope this can be useful in your response to those asking questions, these are not new findings but data that have been previously published when PISA was published.”
“The World Bank admits to one error: the release of old data based on 2019 PISA scores to the public without informing DepEd. Thus, DepEd and the Philippine government were subjected to public censure and criticism. Even if done inadvertently, the World Bank has inflicted harm on DepEd and the government.”
The second and more important error which the World Bank inflicted on DepEd was its omission of the initiatives which are being undertaken even before the PISA results came out, and are being refined further based on analysis of the results of PISA and the other international assessments.
Take note, the letter is all about technicalities and protocols. Nowhere is there a denial of the results reflected in the World Bank report, whether they are from a 2019 document or an older one, whether they are from the previous administrations or from the turn of the century.
There is nothing from this memorandum demonstrating grief over a collateral finding from the report about the “growth mindset” present among our students. From this mindset proceeds the terror cogently captured by the report how a significant number of students (from the sample), do not believe they can become more intelligent.
Somewhere in the report, the term, “silent pandemic” is used to define health and nutrition problems, which are contributory to a student’s ineffectual performance in schools. There is another silent pandemic though that spreads from this report and all reports on education in the country, and this is the silent pandemic of poverty, both of the society and in the minds of those who are tasked with educating our youth.
As for the perception that the report has shamed the nation, shall we turn that sense of entitlement into guilt in all of us—politicians, leaders and educators—because we have shamed and failed the education of the people?
E-mail: titovaliente@yahoo.com