When it comes to influence, the educational system of the Philippines has been affected immensely by the country's colonial history including the Spanish period, American period, and Japanese rule and occupation. Although having been significantly influenced by all its colonizers with regard to the educational system, the most influential and deep-rooted contributions arose during the American occupation (1898); it was during this aforementioned period that 1. English was introduced as the primary language of instruction and 2. A public education system was first established - a system specifically patterned after the United States school system and further administered by the newly established Department of Instruction. Similar to the United States of America, the Philippines has had an extensive and extremely inclusive system of education including features such as higher education.
The present Philippine Educational system firstly covers six years of compulsory education (from grades 1 to 6), divided informally into two levels - both composed of three years. The first level is known as the Primary Level and the second level is known as the Intermediate Level.
However, although the Philippine educational system has extensively been a model for other Southeast Asian countries, in recent years such a matter has no longer stood true, and such a system has been deteriorated - such a fact is especially evident and true in the country's more secluded poverty-stricken regions.
Nationwide the Philippines faces several issues when it comes to the educational system.
Quality of Education
First of which, is the quality of education. In the year 2014, the National Achievement Test (NAT) and the National Career Assessment Examination (NCAE) results show that there had been a decline in the quality of Philippine education at the elementary and secondary levels. The students' performance in both the 2014 NAT and NCAE were excessively below the target mean score. Having said this, the poor quality of the Philippine educational system is manifested in the comparison of completion rates between highly urbanized city of Metro Manila, which is also happens to be not only the country's capital but the largest metropolitan area in the Philippines and other places in the country such as Mindanao and Eastern Visayas. Although Manila is able to boast a primary school completion rate of approximately 100 percent, other areas of the nation, such as Eastern Visayas and Mindanao, hold primary school completion rate of only 30 percent or even less. This kind of statistic is no surprise to the education system in the Philippine context, students who hail from Philippine urban areas have the financial capacity to complete at the very least their primary school education.
Budget for Education
The second issue that the Philippine educational system faces is the budget for education. Although it has been mandated by the Philippine Constitution for the government to allocate the highest proportion of its government to education, the Philippines remains to have one of the lowest budget allocations to education among ASEAN countries.
Affordability of Education
The third prevalent issue the Philippine educational system continuously encounters is the affordability of education (or lack thereof). A big disparity in educational achievements is evident across various social groups. Socioeconomically disadvantaged students otherwise known as students who are members of high and low-income poverty-stricken families, have immensely higher drop-out rates in the elementary level. Additionally, most freshmen students at the tertiary level come from relatively well-off families.
Drop-out Rate (Out-of-school youth)
France Castro, secretary of Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT), stated that there is a graved need to address the alarming number of out-of-school youth in the country. The Philippines overall has 1.4 million children who are out-of-school, according to UNESCO's data, and is additionally the only ASEAN country that is included in the top 5 countries with the highest number of out-of-school youth. In 2012, the Department of Education showed data of a 6.38% drop-out rate in primary school and a 7.82% drop-out rate in secondary school. Castro further stated that "the increasing number of out-of-school children is being caused by poverty. The price increases in prices of oil, electricity, rice, water, and other basic commodities are further pushing the poor into dire poverty." Subsequently, as more families become poorer, the number of students enrolled in public schools increases, especially in the high school level. In 2013, the Department of Education estimated that there are 38, 503 elementary schools alongside 7,470 high schools.
Mismatch
There is a large mismatch between educational training and actual jobs. This stands to be a major issue at the tertiary level and it is furthermore the cause of the continuation of a substantial amount of educated yet unemployed or underemployed people. According to Dean Salvador Belaro Jr., the Cornell-educated Congressman representing 1-Ang Edukasyon Party-list in the House of Representatives, the number of educated unemployed reaches around 600,000 per year. He refers to said condition as the "education gap".
Brain Drain
Brain Drain is a persistent problem evident in the educational system of the Philippines due to the modern phenomenon of globalization, with the number of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) who worked abroad at any time during the period April to September 2014 was estimated at 2.3 million. This ongoing mass emigration subsequently inducts an unparalleled brain drain alongside grave economic implications. Additionally, Philippine society hitherto is footing the bill for the education of millions who successively spend their more productive years abroad. Thus, the already poor educational system of the Philippines indirectly subsidizes the opulent economies who host the OFWs.
Social Divide
There exists a problematic and distinct social cleavage with regard to educational opportunities in the country. Most modern societies have encountered an equalizing effect on the subject of education. This aforementioned divide in the social system has made education become part of the institutional mechanism that creates a division between the poor and the rich.
Lack of Facilities and Teacher Shortage in Public Schools
There are large-scale shortages of facilities across Philippine public schools - these include classrooms, teachers, desks and chairs, textbooks, and audio-video materials. According to 2003 Department of Education
Undersecretary Juan Miguel Luz, reportedly over 17 million students are enrolled in Philippine public schools, and at an annual population growth rate of 2.3 per cent, about 1.7 million babies are born every year which means that in a few years time, more individuals will assert ownership over their share of the (limited) educational provisions. To sum it up, there are too many students and too little resources. Albeit the claims the government makes on increasing the allocated budget for education, there is a prevalent difficulty the public school system faces with regard to shortages. Furthermore, state universities and colleges gradually raise tuition so as to have a means of purchasing facilities, thus making tertiary education difficult to access or more often than not, inaccessible to the poor. However, it is worth taking note of what the Aquino administration has done in its five years of governance with regard to classroom-building - the number of classrooms built from 2005 to the first half of the year 2010 has tripled. Additionally, the number of classrooms that were put up from the year 2010 to February 2015 was recorded to be at 86,478, significantly exceeding the 17,305 classrooms that were built from 2005 to 2010 and adequate enough to counterbalance the 66,800 classroom deficit in the year 2010.
In President Aquino's fourth state of the nation address (SONA), he spoke of the government's achievement of zero backlog in facilities such as classrooms, desks and chairs, and textbooks which has addressed the gap in the shortages of teachers, what with 56,085 new teachers for the 61, 510 teaching items in the year 2013. However, the data gathered by the Department of Education shows that during the opening of classes (June 2013), the shortages in classrooms was pegged at 19, 579, 60 million shortages when it came to textbooks, 2.5 million shortages with regard to chairs, and 80, 937 shortages of water and sanitation facilities. Furthermore, 770 schools in Metro Manila, Cebu, and Davao were considered overcrowded. The Department of Education also released data stating that 91% of the 61, 510 shortages in teachers was filled up alongside appointments (5, 425 to be specific) are being processed
Issues regarding the K-12
There is dispute with regard to the quality of education provided by the system. In the year 2014, the National Achievement Test (NAT) and the National Career Assessment Examination (NCAE) results show that there had been a decline in the quality of Philippine education at the elementary and secondary levels. The students' performance in both the 2014 NAT and NCAE were excessively below the target mean score. Having said this, the poor quality of the Philippine educational system is manifested in the comparison of completion rates between highly urbanized city of Metro Manila, which is also happens to be not only the country's capital but the largest metropolitan area in the Philippines and other places in the country such as Mindanao and Eastern Visayas. Although Manila is able to boast a primary school completion rate of approximately 100 percent, other areas of the nation, such as Eastern Visayas and Mindanao, hold primary school completion rate of only 30 percent or even less. This kind of statistic is no surprise to the education system in the Philippine context, students who hail from Philippine urban areas have the financial capacity to complete at the very least their primary school education.
The second issue that the Philippine educational system faces is the budget for education. Although it has been mandated by the Philippine Constitution for the government to allocate the highest proportion of its government to education, the Philippines remains to have one of the lowest budget allocations to education among ASEAN countries. The third prevalent issue the Philippine educational system continuously encounters is the affordability of education (or lack thereof). A big disparity in educational achievements is evident across various social groups. Socioeconomically disadvantaged students otherwise known as students who are members of high and low-income poverty-stricken families, have immensely higher drop-out rates in the elementary level. Additionally, most freshmen students at the tertiary level come from relatively well-off families. Lastly, there is a large proportion of mismatch, wherein there exists a massive proportion of mismatch between training and actual jobs. This stands to be a major issue at the tertiary level and it is furthermore the cause of the continuation of a substantial amount of educated yet unemployed or underemployed people.