Press Release
January 16, 2007

Proposed 2007 budget bill to ensure hiring
of competent teachers, says Drilon

Liberal Party (LP) President Franklin Drilon today revealed that a special provision has been included in the 2007 national budget bill that will ensure the hiring of competent teachers to eradicate the existing shortage of public school teachers nationwide.

Drilon, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said when President Arroyo signs the proposed P1.126 trillion national budget for this year, more competent teachers with expertise in mathematics and the sciences will be hired, addressing the need to raise the quality of public education in the country.

"An additional budget of P873 million will be allocated for the creation of additional teaching positions that will effectively wipe out the shortage of public school teachers in the country. The total allocation for new teachers now stands at almost P2 billion," Drilon told reporters.

"Priority in the hiring of new teachers will be given to those with college degrees in mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology and general science," he pointed out.

On Thursday, Drilon revealed that the Bicameral Conference Committee has broken the deadlock on the 2007 budget bill after a series of meetings with his House counterpart, Albay Rep. Joey Salceda.

The bicam committee agreed on a compromise version of the budget that shall be submitted for ratification by Congress when session resumes this month, Drilon said. The bill can then be presented for the President's signature before Congress adjourns on February 10.

Drilon noted that a report from the Department of Education (DepEd) showed that majority of Science teachers and a significant percentage of Math teachers at the high school level of public schools were not science or math majors.

"It is deplorable to note that as much as 73 percent of Physics teachers in high school are not Physics majors and 20 percent of Math teachers are non-majors. This is the reason why our students have dwindling proficiencies in these subjects," Drilon said.

Drilon added that there was an urgent need to improve the competency of Filipino students in Math and the Sciences in order to be part of a globally competitive work force in the future.

"Under this budget, over 16,390 teachers will be hired. By the end of 2007, we can say that there will be no more teacher deficiency," Drilon said.

During the budget deliberations in the Senate last year, Drilon expressed alarm over the poor state of the country's public education system, citing a DepEd study indicating that only 14 out of 100 Filipinos who go to school are able to graduate from college every year.

Saying that the Philippines was "alarmingly education-poor," Drilon noted that the public school system was suffering currently from a shortage of 20,587 classrooms, 30.6 million textbooks, 16,390 teachers, and 26,282 principals. This, he said, prompted the Senate to recommend a huge increase in the budget of the DepEd this year.

During Senate committee scrutiny of the DepEd budget, Education Secretary Jesli Lapus revealed that for every 100 pupils who entered grade 1, only 66 made it to grade 6, 58 to first year high school, 43 to fourth year high school, 23 to first year college, and only 14 graduate from college.

Lapus revealed that 200,000 or eight percent of all six-year-olds don't enter the formal school system at all. By grade six, a third of the 2.6 million pupils who entered grade 1 shall have dropped out, Lapus said.

"That's more than 800,000. With the 200,000 who never get into the country's school system, that's a million young people every year," Drilon noted.

The senator said the sad state of Philippine education was reflected not just in the quantity but also in the quality of its graduates. Citing DepEd statistics, Drilon said most grade 6 pupils have the competencies of those in grade 4. "Only 20 percent of grade 6 have the competencies of grade 6," he said.

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