Vice President Leni Robredo’s plan to raise annual government spending for education equivalent to six percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product is “her budget message told in advance.”
Former Education Secretary Armin Luistro said the vice president’s promise will soon be expressed in pesos, “right on the maiden budget of her administration.”
Among the first bills the next president will send to Congress is the national budget, which under the Constitution must be submitted to the legislature within a month after the “State of the Nation Address” in July.
“And that document will partially redeem her promise of bigger funding for our schools,” said Luistro.
More than 90 former officials of the Department of Education, among them six former education secretaries, have expressed support for Robredo, saying that she has “solid experience and a grounded understanding of the education sector.”
In a joint statement, the group said Robredo and her running mate, Sen. Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan, had presented concrete plans to address the needs of the teachers and bring “honest and effective governance” to the state’s largest bureaucracy.
Lawyer Alex Lacson, who is running for senator, said a major priority of the Robredo administration “is to ensure that victims of the pandemic, who suffered from the hardship of remote learning, will not end up as the ‘Lost Generation.’”
Lacson said that under a Robredo administration, “education will witness a great restart,” that is, “stepped-up spending for more and better teachers and smart and safe schools.”
The National Economic and Development Authority has estimated that the pandemic will cost the country economy in the long term Pph 41.4 trillion, about Php 10.7 trillion of which will be in lost wages and productivity of future workers whose education is disrupted by the lockdowns.
The agency estimated that the one-year school closure cost the economy Php 230 billion in 2020, and its impact over the next 40 years of the students’ lifetimes in the labor force is estimated at Php 10.7 trillion.
To prevent that loss from happening, Lacson said the total national budget for “education and manpower” should breach the one-trillion-peso mark next year.
The senatorial aspirant in Robredo’s team noted that this year’s “education, culture and manpower development” appropriations total Php 803 billion, or about 3.64 percent of the GDP.
During the presidential debate on Saturday, Robredo said she would raise it to six percent of the GDP following the standard set by the United Nations.
She said the additional budget will be used to increase teachers’ pay and training, fix the learning–employment disconnect, put more focus on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, or STEM learning, and establish more regional centers of excellence, to name a few.
Lacson said Robredo’s firm grasp of the challenges facing schools and learners made her the education sector’s choice for president.
She has gained the endorsement of the best and biggest schools in the country, in all regions, across religions, covering all stakeholders from administrators, faculty and students, noted Lacson.
“Siya ang ‘teacher’s pet’ because she is a quick study, does her assignment, and she stands up for recitation of her plans, hindi katulad ng iba dyan absent ng absent,” said the senatorial candidate. PR
