By Anthony A. Araos
While new school buildings have been sitting the landscape rapidly over the years in northern Luzon provinces, only a few were constructed in Ifugao. Why the lag?
“It doesn’t really matter to me,” a Lagawe resident said. “I’m happy with the Gotad parade,” she added. Folks will almost say the same. Almost everyone I heard it so many times.
The young learner’s life began at classrooms at impoverished and distant villages in Ifugao, where he or she relied on crude platforms to gain knowledge.
Were Luhong Elementary School in Tinoc and Banga Elementary School in Lagawe continue to fall behind in quality of education because of dismal learning conditions? In many other villages across the province, this holds true and that’s when you knew something is indeed wrong somewhere.
It’s disheartening to folks in remote barangay and even in the town proper are suffering from this longstanding problem. To my mind, it’s disgusting!
Poor proficiency in mathematics, reading and science is very alarming. The ability to use their reading, math and science knowledge and skills to meet real-life challenges has been hampered. Small wonder, even the Department of Education (DepEd) admitted that Filipino students are five to six years behind in learning competencies.
Basically, the aforementioned public schools are situated in small localities, and the casual observer would never even notice obscure activities going behind the schools’ scenes. Oh well, at least there’s a public school in these far-away villages. These are small barangays with a few inhabitants.
I say, we do what is requested to demolish condemned school buildings and construct new ones to replace dilapidated and aging ones to protect the best interest of the education sector.
It’s high time to put up future-fit school buildings. For short, school buildings with a design to make them adapted to climate change and compliant with latest international standards. The end goal is surely to create classrooms more conducive to learning.
The issue of elevating the quality of education in Ifugao in particular, and in the Philippines, in general, is as much about addressing first the problem on how and why education remained underfunded in the country.
Fact: the Philippines is lagging behind the global standard of allocating at least four to six percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) set by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Naturally, the issue of overworked but underpaid teacher arises. According to a report in 2023 of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), an average of 1,500 Filipino teachers has left the country from 2020 to 2023. A Lagawe Central School teacher left the “most noble profession” to sell shoes and slippers.
Providentially, we’re being led to a (hopefully) brighter future.
At the just-concluded CARAA Meet in La Trinidad, Benguet, Ifugao schools division office superintendent Virginia Ambon-Batan outlined a timely school buildings construction plan. On the other hand, the ideas advanced by Governor Jerry Dalipog should help in upgrading the situation. At a meeting at Puguis Elementary School, Governor Dalipog welcomed the master plan taking shape. I am also perplexed with the exchange between the governor and provincial and municipal officials on this matter. Many of them already focused on 2028 polls.
This is a very good opportunity to really look to the not-so-distant future, rethink how DepEd is doing things, and set lofty goals in the coming years- that Ifugao students have a brighter tomorrow if they have access to quality education.
Where do these insights leave the education sector across Ifugao, nowhere better than a quagmire of poverty, underdevelopment and ignorance.
I believe Superintendent Batan should hold a consultation with the private sector. This sector is considered a critical component of the development plan for learners. It is one that will have to be done sooner rather than later.**
