Big 4 admission tests to continue

Questions are asked whether tertiary institutions will conduct college admission tests this year with the transition to the K-12 (Kindergarten to Grade 12) Basic Education Program.

This school year’s fourth year high school students will not graduate until they complete the two-year senior high school (SHS) in 2018.

But for the country’s “Big Four” universities—University of the Philippines (UP), Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU), De La Salle University (DLSU) and University of Santo Tomas (UST)—that have consistently attracted sizeable numbers of college applicants, the show will go on.

Several schools, mainly privately owned, had already made the transition to the 12-year curriculum even before the formal implementation of the K-12 program. So the Big Four expect to administer their entrance tests to pioneering K-12 graduates.

But the tests will be on a much smaller scale admittedly.

Last year, before the official end of the 10-year basic education program, data obtained by the Inquirer showed that over 180,000 applicants took college admission tests by the Big Four.

As the country’s premier state university, UP has been the most sought-after, with an average of 76,531 applicants from 2010 to 2015.

UST posted an average of 48,000 applicants during the same period while ADMU had a five-year average of 20,000 applicants. DLSU was unable to provide the

Inquirer with data.

As a result of the shift to K-12, the number of freshman college applicants will drastically drop in the next two years, with most current junior high school students required to complete two more years, Grades 11 and 12, and will not graduate

after fourth year this academic year.

But Jumela Sarmiento, director of ADMU Office of Admission and Aid, said a few secondary schools would be graduating students in 2016. These graduates would be eligible for college in academic year 2016-2017.

“We will require from these high schools a certification or letter from the Department of Education that … the schools’ graduates will be eligible to apply for tertiary education for academic year 2016-2017,” Sarmiento said.

Early implementation

Aurora Odette Mendoza, director of the UP Office of Admissions, said they found out that some schools across the country had been authorized “early implementation of the K-12 program.”

She said that while the Department of Education (DepEd) announced that Grade 11 would start in 2016, they learned there were some schools that had offered Grade 11 several years before the formal implementation of the K-12 program.

“Therefore, they (students) will [enter] Grade 12 by 2015 and in 2016 they will graduate. We assume that they are eligible to go into tertiary education,” Mendoza said.

As of May, there were 95 non-DepEd schools (not under DepEd jurisdiction), like private, higher education and technical-vocational institutions and state universities and colleges (SUCs), that started offering SHS in 2014-2015, DepEd data showed.

At least 240 non-DepEd schools will offer SHS in 2015-2016 and an additional 1,824 schools in 2016-2017 for a total of 2,158 by June 2016.

Of the 5,899 public schools selected to offer SHS in June 2016, requests for funds had already been submitted for 3,839 with the Department of Budget and Management. Separate requests for new buildings and other facilities for the schools were submitted to the Department of Public Works and Highways, DepEd data showed.

UP also expected high school graduates who had not applied for college admission before to try to enroll this school year when Republic Act No. 10648, the Iskolar ng Bayan Act of 2014, would take effect, Mendoza said.

The law provides scholarships to top 10 graduating students from public high schools, who meet an SUC’s admission requirements. Candidates for scholarship should enroll in an SUC within two years after graduating from high school.

For these and other students seeking entry to UP, Mendoza said “we will be administering the UP College Admission Test (UPCAT) 2016, with the same standards of selection.”

Meanwhile, DLSU would announce soon new application periods and testing dates, said Johannes Leo Badillo, director for operations of the university’s Office for Strategic Communication.

UST also had yet to finalize its new admission schedules, requirements and procedures including new program offerings, said Marie Ann Sunga-Vargas, director of the Office for Admissions.

The university would also be preparing for the admission of Grades 11 and 12 students in 2016 to the UST High School and UST Education High School, the university’s two independent secondary schools, Vargas said.

Preparing for 2018

While UP had administered a completely new test each year, Mendoza said UPCAT 2018 would be different as it would have to take into account new competencies gained by graduates of the K-12 program.

“We have been studying the K-12 curricula from Grades 9 to 12 and examining the significant differences between the old [and new] basic education programs. The study is ongoing because the modules for Grades 11 and 12 are still not available,” Mendoza said.

UP would also consider changes implied by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) integration framework and the Philippine qualifications framework, she said.

Mendoza added, “Our admissions process is regularly reviewed to increase both access and equity, while ensuring excellence and integrity among our students.”

Sarmiento said Ateneo’s admission process would adapt to the SHS program, which had specialization subjects for academic, sports, arts and design and technical-vocational livelihood tracks.

In DLSU, a new college admission battery of tests would be implemented to measure the applicant’s college readiness, Badillo said.

This was prompted by the New Lasallian Core Curriculum and the need to measure freshmen’s achievements in relevant subject areas in K-12, he said.

UST had yet to finalize its admission policies for 2016-2017, Vargas said.