Philippine Daily Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines—According to the Department of Education, or DepEd, students who make it to the third grade are more likely to stay in school. Unfortunately, the DepEd reports, the net enrollment rate in the elementary grades has dropped from 90.29 percent five academic years ago to 83.22 percent in the last school year.

In absolute terms, the number of students enrolled in all public and private grade schools has risen only minimally, from 12.99 million in 2002-2003 to 13.14 million in 2006-2007—the result, in all likelihood, of sheer momentum generated by the country’s high population growth rate.

Poverty explains the long-term decline, top government officials say. Indeed, between June 2004 and June 2005, the number of grade school students even fell by about 90,000, from 13.096 million to 13.006 million. That must mean that, in academic year 2005-2006, poverty worsened at a faster rate than the population grew.

We can expect worse numbers for the current school year. Both President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Augusto Santos have placed part of the blame for the continuing decline on inflation. The President ordered the DepEd to allow students not to wear school uniforms, to help compensate for the rising cost of goods and services. Santos saw the problem from the same perspective saying, “The decline in the number of enrollees has something to do more with price increases. Although incomes of families increased, the rise was not enough to compensate for the rising cost of goods and services, such as those required in sending children to school.”

It may be more accurate to say, however, that the spike in inflation is a factor this school year; before the surge in fuel and food prices in the last several months, inflation was largely a docile, domesticated beast. In other words, the inflation factor the President and the secretary of Socioeconomic Planning point to is likely an anticipated one.

It does not explain the alarming drop the last five years in elementary-level net enrollment. If poverty is the main cause of the decline, then it means that the economy is in worse shape than our robust gross national product growth rates tell us. Or that, despite healthy economic indicators, the poor are really getting poorer.

Consider the fact that the same DepEd statistics show a remarkable growth in the number of students enrolled in preschool. From 751,000 in 2002-2003, the total exploded to 961,000 last year, in 2006-2007. A closer look at the sub-totals for private and public pre-schools is even more revealing. Five years ago, the difference between enrollment in private preschools and that in public ones was about 67,000 students. Last year, the difference more than doubled to 161,000. To put it another way, enrollment in private preschools grew almost three times more in the five-year period than it did in public pre-schools.

That statistic has economics written all over it.

The Department of Education, under Secretary Jesli Lapus, is well aware of the magnitude of the problem. Recent initiatives like feeding programs and “no collection and no uniform policies,” Lapus said, are meant to keep more students in school. He also noted that the private sector’s adopt-a-school program has grown tenfold from P400 million in 2003 to P4 billion in 2007. “We expect significant improvements in the participation rate [meaning the net enrollment rate] with all these measures,” he said.

All these well-meaning and effective initiatives, however, cannot change the nature of the problem. The country, as measured by the government’s education budget, is not investing enough in education.

Education’s share in the government budget technically remains the biggest single slice of the trillion-peso pie, and thus keeps to the Constitution’s unique mandate. But accounting sleight of hand actually allows the government to devote more funds to the servicing of the country’s debt. If the government were to align other allocations (such as social welfare funds or a certain portion of the congressional pork barrel) to specified education-related initiatives (such as more feeding programs or increased provision of school supplies), perhaps more students will be encouraged to stay in school.

The best solution is for government to allot more money for education.