THE state of Philippine education is alarming.

        According to wires of the Agence France Press as reported in the national papers early this month, an alarming number of students about to enter Philippine universities lacked a basic mastery of key subjects, while those entering high school fared only marginally better.

        The news wire, quoting from a report of the National Statistical Coordination Board, said barely any fourth year student or sixth grader achieved the 75 percent “mastery” benchmark for Mathematics, Science, Filipino and English languages, and Social Studies.

        It said further that while somewhat better than the 2003-2004 scores, the results of a national achievement test for 2004-2005 school year “revealed that the quality of basic education in the country remains poor.”

        It should be noted that the results of the 2003 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study that appeared on the websites showed that Filipino fourth graders ranked third last in both Math and Science among 25 countries, while second year Filipino high school students ranked 41st in Math and 42nd in Science among 45 countries tested.

        And as if these were not enough, a study conducted by the British Council showed that while the country is bursting at the seams with colleges and universities, young Filipinos’ access to quality education has remained problematic.

        The study hinted that the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) which oversees around 1,400 colleges and universities in the country has miserably failed in its role as “gatekeeper” of the country’s tertiary education. In previous years, CHED has been reduced to an agency that merely issues permits to operate and recognizes schools as institutes of higher education, the same British Council study showed.

        Among other factors cited for having contributed to the sad state of education today is political pressure that impedes educational institutions, especially CHED, from carrying out its tasks. A CHED commissioner has admitted that “there is very little chance that any significant change in CHED could be effected in the near future with the excessive political pressure in the decision-making process. He said there are “politically-driven” representatives from Congress who want to “immortalize themselves” by establishing universities and colleges without educational capability. “Even if some schools lack the necessary requirements, politics still win, especially if the congressman is influential,” another CHED official sadly stated.

        The irony is that these congressmen were privileged to have studied in exclusive schools which relatively deliver higher quality of education, and yet these congressmen alumni continue to look and act stupid, unable or unwilling to contribute to the betterment of the country’s educational system. They only need to keep away from tampering with our public school system to make a significant contribution to its uplift. Look at them imprinting their names on the schools’ gates and rooftops, which they after all deserve for making the state of our education so alarming indeed!

        And the worse part is that their tribe continues to increase in addition to poor, malnourished morons being churned out by our substandard schools.

        Our students today are becoming poorer in Math and yet we have many crooked men in the corridors of power who are geniuses in counting votes, or in extracting to the last percentage point their commissions from kickbacks. These #!%$*#@&!!