A reaction paper submitted last January 8, 2010 regarding today’s Philippine Educational System for the subject, Quality Management.
Apathy is said to be a state of indifference or the suppression of emotions may it be excitement, motivation, concern or passion. A person who has no interest or concern to social, emotional or physical life is an apathetic individual.
Today’s Philippine educational system follows the 6-4-4 step ladder. Six years is allocated for elementary, four years for high school and four years for college. In the course of these years, there is active interaction between and among students, teachers, administrators, the government and the general community.
From these interactions, various problems sprouted and it is made especially apparent in public schools. Question after question rose. How much budget should the government allocate to education? When will additional classrooms be built? Will there be enough number of teachers? Will there be enough to support their wages? From this point of view it is not the students which are given focus but those which facilitate their education.
I believe that to sustain the quality of today’s education these facilitators need to exert themselves. Enough volunteerism can pave the way to improve the current state of our educational system. For example, government projects addressing educational system’s problems may be initiated. Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) may be sought to support schools to curb the latter’s budget constraints. School administrators may propose tie-up with corporations thereby strengthening the school’s facilities and technological support. Such is one of the practices of the University of the Philippines, University of the Cordilleras and such other universities and colleges in the country. Scholarships may also be offered to better attract education major students. For public elementary schools, parents and the community may be sought to work together in building classrooms such as the project initiated by a local program, “Wish Ko Lang”. As long as this side of the educational workforce tends to be aware and concerned with the welfare of our community’s student demographics, solutions to our educational system’s problems will be found and will be implemented. There just has to be a trigger—someone who will stand up and volunteer.
From the facilitators of education, let us shift to the students. After all, problems in education cannot only be attributed to those who facilitate it but also to those for whom it is done. Being an educator, I see students today as having access to a greater number and variety of resources which can supplement their classroom education. However, through keen observation, I see some who simply settle for mediocrity and memorize text from books and copy everything that the teacher writes and say what the teacher says in verbatim. This is evidenced by the deafening passivity among students in most colleges and universities, coupled with their seeming indifference to participate in shaping their own education. It is apparent that these students who are given the chance to learn do not want to be taught or simply go to school to get a diploma. However, one can also see others who have to work extra hard for their education such as scholars or working students. There is also a few who do not go to school at all because they believe that education is for the rich and privileged—a mentality passed down from our ancestors by our country’s colonizers. This may be true before but not today. Privileged students may have a greater number of books, notebooks and supplies. But think about it. They may have more than enough things to break their backs or dislocate their shoulders, but they may be missing something essential to all students whoever they may be—motivation and hard work.
In the course of one’s study, one may be pushed hard or extremely pressured until one’s limit. That is simply no reason to give up or run away. Rather, it is a chance to prove one’s worth and what one is made of. After all, students primarily go to school to learn, don’t they? The greatest thing they simply have to overcome is just themselves and their apathy.
Curbing apathy to our country’s educational system’s problems opens new opportunities for everyone—both education facilitators and students. We just have to exert a little to hopefully and eventually reap the benefits of our labor.
Popularity: 1% [?]
The Apathy: Core Problem in Today’s Philippine Educational System by Ma. Grace Carpizo, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Philippines License.
Nice story, hey I stumbled on to this article while surfing for lyric updates. Thanks for sharing I’ll email my friends about this too.
Thanks for the awesome post!