SENIOR high school students will have to undergo more hours of on-the-job training and apprenticeship as part of efforts to further hone their skills and increase their chances of being employed, Education Secretary Sonny Angara said yesterday.
Angara said this was the request made by the DepEd’s industry partners.
“We want to place a greater emphasis on links with industry and place more hours. That’s the request of the industry, to have more hours of on-the-job training and apprenticeship,” Angara said during the Day of the Future event hosted by the Swiss Embassy in Makati.
“That also dovetails with the President’s instruction to us to make our senior high school graduates more employable. Because the record has not been great in terms of our senior high school graduates getting work,” he added.
President Marcos Jr. had earlier directed Angara to prioritize improving the employability of senior high school graduates.
A report released by the Philippine Business for Education in July showed there are now more companies open to hiring senior high school graduates but many still prefer
college graduates, adding that the job-skills mismatch persists.
The report, titled “PBEd’s 2024 Jobs Outlook Study” covering 299 participant companies, showed that almost half or 46 percent of them currently hire K to 12 graduates, while large companies – 63 percent – are more likely to hire compared with micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME).
The report said this is an improvement over a similar study in 2018 which found that only three out of five companies were willing to hire senior high school graduates.
The 2018 study also showed that only one out of five firms were ready with hiring policies for senior high school graduates.
However, the 2024 study showed that only 27 percent of entry-level jobs were projected to be filled up by senior high school graduates as companies still prefer to hire applicants with college degrees.
PBEd said the labor market, government, industry and academic institutions need to work closely together to address the gap.
Angara said they understood the challenges facing senior high school graduates in terms of skills and employability, adding this will be addressed in the ongoing review of the senior high school or K to 12 curriculum.
“We’re still struggling with the contents of the curriculum and trying to simplify it and make it more responsive to the needs of the industry. And we’re also aiming for greater mastery,” he said.
Angara also said the department would like to see greater linkages and partnerships with other embassies to emulate what the Swiss government is doing to help Filipino students.
Under the program, the Swiss Embassy will select Filipino learners to visit the offices of Swiss companies to give them a feel of the working environment, get to know more about the company and immerse themselves in various professional fields.
Angara said the Swiss government’s initiatives also dovetail with a lot of programs the DepEd is promoting.
“Perhaps this will open a path for them to have similar events in the future in different localities. It would be nice to have such an event in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao going forward,” he added.
ILLITERACY WOES
A former president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) urged member schools of the Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines (CEAP) to help address the problem of youth illiteracy in the country.
Speaking at the opening of the 2024 CEAP National Assembly in Davao City, Davao Archbishop Romulo Valles said it is imperative for Catholic educators to take a more active role in helping improve the Filipino youth’s level of literacy.
“As Christian educators, we cannot, in conscience, allow our youth to be condemned to a life of illiteracy and ignorance through no fault of their own,” Valles said.
“We should participate in solving the problem by walking alongside the youth as pilgrims, and accompany them in their journey towards enlightened literacy,” he added
Valles said this is because the illiteracy woes in the country are at an alarming state.
“This means that we are met with a problem that cannot be ignored, much less trifled with,” Valles said.
He said this means that Catholic educators must be willing to go the extra mile in helping today’s youth.
“This is what our faith demands of us: to reach out to all and sundry, even to those beyond our normal boundaries and scope of influence,” said Valles.
Based on the most recent findings of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2022, the Philippines remains among the world’s weakest in math, reading, and science.
A World Bank (WB) report in 2021 similarly noted that 90 percent of Filipino kids are unable to read and understand a simple text by age 10.
CEAP has more than 1,525 member schools across the country.
The CEAP National Assembly gathers all Catholic educators, administrators, and stakeholders across the Philippines. – With Gerard Naval
