K + 12 .. by Joel Jayme

Dear Professor,

Greetings of Peace!

Last Saturday when I heard and learned about the Enhanced K + 12 Basic Education Program, I realized that the goal of the Enhanced K+12 Basic Education Program is to create a functional basic education system that will produce productive and responsible citizens equipped with the essential competencies and skills for both life-long learning and employment. The program will enhance the basic education system to full functionality to fulfill the basic learning needs of students. This is in line with the agenda of the President Aquino of having quality education as a long-term solution to poverty. In order to achieve these goals, the program has the following twin-objectives:

a) To give every student an opportunity to receive quality education based on an enhanced and decongested curriculum that is internationally recognized and comparable

b) To change public perception that high school education is just a preparation for college; rather, it should allow one to take advantage of opportunities for gainful career or employment and/or self-employment in a rapidly changing and increasingly globalized environment.

Enhancing the quality of basic education in the Philippines is urgent and critical. Thus, we have to come up with a proposal to enhance our basic education program in a manner that is least disruptive to the current curriculum, most affordable to government and families, and aligned with international practice. 2 The poor quality of basic education is reflected in the low achievement scores of Filipino students. Many students who finish basic education do not possess sufficient mastery of basic competencies. One reason is that students do not get adequate instructional time or time on task. The National Achievement Test (NAT) for grade 6 in SY 2009-2010 passing rate is only 69.21%. Although this is already a 24% improvement over the SY 2005-2006 passing rate, further reforms are needed to achieve substantial improvement. The NAT for high school is 46.38% in SY 2009-2010, a slight decrease from 47.40% in SY 2008-2009. 3 International tests results like 2003 TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) rank the Philippines 34th out of 38 countries in HS II Math and 43rd out of 46 countries in HS II Science; for grade 4, the Philippines ranked 23rd out of 25 participating countries in both Math and Science In 2008, even with only the science high schools participating in the Advanced Mathematics category, the Philippines was ranked lowest.

Therefore as a School Administrator, I am in favor of the additional 2 years of elementary and high school in order to cope up the demand of time. We are the only country who implements 1o year elementary and secondary education. If we will compare the graduates from the different countries we are much behind compared to their graduates. It is a high time to apply the enhanced K+12 basic education in our country to address the problem on quality education.