DepEd Sec. Prof. Leonor Briones: OJT Students Should be Paid

The next Department of Education (DepEd) Secretary Prof. Leonor Briones warned schools and companies that they should stp the practice of letting on-the-job students pay for their training. The former national treasurer of the Philippines and a long-time activists pointed out that earning income while honing the crafts of OJTs would ease the burdens of families facing two additional years of tuition and other costs under the K-12 program.

Leonor Briones

On-the-Job Training or OJT’s are required in the 11th and 12th grade to improve the graduates’ absorption into the workforce based upon the K-12 track for technical and vocational education. The appointed DepEd Secretary also noted that if the paid OJT proposal is implemented, it would need the involvement of both the DepEd and the DOLE.

Sec. Briones, however, said the incoming administration would monitor the situation before making the decision to continue, suspend, or abolish the K-12 program. The K-12 program was first implemented on June 2013. Before the K-12 Program was first implemented nationwide, compulsory kindergarten was already implemented in 2012

The following year, President Benigno Aquino signed into law the Enhanced Basic Education Act, which mandated the addition of grades 11 and 12 to meet with international standards.Militant organizations oppose K-12 on grounds that it allegedly strengthens the country’s labor-export policies, leads to displacement of teachers, and cause more dropouts of students from poor families.

The Philippine national government acknowledge a shortage of 50,000 classrooms but it refused to delay the K-12 program until resolution of infrastructure and poor teacher-student and book-student ratios.

Even before K-12, 50 percent of children who start primary education never graduate from high school, Briones stressed. The government’s 2015 figures state that this has dropped to 40%, still high for a country with a largely young population.

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