K+12 Research Paper free essay sample

The DepEd, for its part, appears determined to enact the program with its  proposed budget catering mostly  to preparing the grounds for its eventual implementation. The DepEd argues that the K-12 program will be the solution to yearly basic education woes and the deteriorating quality of education. Critics, however, counteract that the education crisis needs to be addressed more fundamentally and adding more school years would only exacerbate the situation. Dissecting K-12 The  K-12 model  is an educational system for basic and secondary education patterned after the  United States,Canada, and some parts of  Australia. The current basic education system is also an archetype of American schooling but with a 10-year cycle. DepEd reasons that it is high time to adopt a K-12 system, attributing the low achievement scores and poor quality of basic education to the present school setup. Following wide protests over the proposal, the departmentreleased  its official position defending K-12. We will write a custom essay sample on K+12 Research Paper or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Below are the main arguments and corresponding counter-arguments from critics. 1. The K-12 will solve the annual growing number of out-of-school youth. Students and parents, however complain that it would be an added burden to poor families. While public education is free, a  political youth groupestimates that a student would still need an average of P20,000 per school year to cover transportation, food, school supplies and other schooling expenses. Also, based on the latest  Family Income and Expenditure Survey, families prioritize spending for food and other basic needs over their children’s school needs. Two more years for basic education would inevitably translate to higher dropout rate. 2. The K-12 will address low achievement scores and poor academic performance of elementary and high school students.DepEd says that the poor quality of basic education is reflected in the low achievement scores of students. Results of the  TIMSS  (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study), however, negate the connection of the number of years to the performance of students. According to results of the TIMSS, the length of schooling does not necessarily mean better scores. In fact, some countries with the same or shorter school cycle garnered the highest scores while those implementing the K-12 model or more years of schooling got lower scores.According to a study released by  former Deputy Education Minister Abraham I. Felipe and Fund for Assistance to Private Education (FAPE) Executive Director Carolina C. Porio, the DepEd’s arguments are â€Å"impressionistic and erroneous† because there is no clear correlation between the length of schooling and students’ performance. The said study shows that fourth graders from  Australia  had respectable TIMSS scores despite having only one year of pre-schooling, while  Morocco  (two years of pre-school),  Norway  (three years) and  Armenia  and  Slovenia(both four years) had lower scores than Australia.South Korea, which has the same length of basic education cycle as the Philippines, was among the top performers in the TIMSS, while those with longer pre-schooling (Ghana, Morocco,  Botswana  and  Saudi Arabia, three years) had lower test scores. Test scores of Filipino students, meanwhile, were lower than those garnered by all 13 countries with shorter elementary cycles, namely,  Russia, Armenia,  Latvia, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Hungary,  Bulgaria, Serbia,Romania,  Moldova,  Italy, Egypt and Iran.In the high school level,  Singapore  that also has a four-year high school cycle, got the highest score. Ironically, the Philippines got a lower score together with countries that have longer high school cycles like South Africa, Chile, Palestine, Morocco and Saudi Arabia. For the pre-college level, the Philippines also got a low score, but so did the  United States, which has a 15-year basic and secondary education cycle. Students from Singapore, South Korea,  Japan  and  Hong Kong, all with shorter education cycles, got higher scores than America students. . The DepEd has enough resources to implement the K-12. Interestingly, countries whose students got high scores in the TIMSS were the ones whose governments allotted high public spending for education. Despite nominal increases in the total education budget, the government has been spending less per capita on education. The real spending per capita per day  dropped  to P6. 85 in 2009. From 2001 to 2009, education’s portion in the national budget has  steadily decreased.This pales in comparison to neighboring countries   Malaysia, 7. 4 percent and  Thailand, 4 percent. It is also lower than the four percent average for all countries that were included in the  World Education Indicators in 2006. The country is also lagging behind its Asian counterparts in public expenditure on education as a percentage of total public spending. In a  statement,  President Benigno Aquino III  said that his administration is prioritizing education and, as proof, the DepEd budget will increase by P32 billion in 2011.