DepEd wants schools to help decongest Metro

Education Secretary Armin Luistro. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—Education Secretary Armin Luistro has asked private schools outside Manila to help reverse the pattern of graduates flocking to the capital looking for jobs.

With the added years in senior high school to be implemented in two years’ time, the former De La Salle University president challenged schools to create programs based on the needs of their localities so their graduates can eventually find work without leaving for the big cities.

“My personal appeal is for private schools to think in reverse,” Luistro told members of the Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines during their recent national basic education commission summit.

“Do not come up with programs that will allow your graduates to go to Manila. There are just too many of those same graduates vying for the jobs here. Is it at all possible to come up with a quick study of the needs of your province or your city, and actually come up with a relevant program which allows your graduates to work in the very city where they were born?” he said.

“I think that will be a challenge that is worth the while of institutions that truly wish to anchor their programs and offerings to the needs of a locality,” Luistro went on.

Schools are now preparing to offer senior high school (Grades 11 and 12) in line with the K to 12 reform, which adds two years of high school and one year of kindergarten to the previous 10-year basic education curriculum.

Grade 11 will officially be implemented nationwide in 2016.

The Department of Education has yet to issue the guide senior high school curriculum, the other school requirements, as well as the subsidy to be offered to senior high school students and teachers in private schools.

“You do not have to wait for the final and official curriculum to be out. The department is happy to be engaged by schools in this regard,” Luistro said.