AGE and EDUCATION

De La Salle University- Manila In partial fulfillment of the requirements for ECONDEV V25

Presented to Ms. Mitzie Conchada School of Economics

Submitted by: Chan, John Rafael H. Ching, Justin Marc Kim, Minji Yagin, Michaella

Contents
Contents...........................................................................................................................................2 I. Introduction...................................................................................................................................2 A. Statement of research question .............................................................................................2 B. Objectives................................................................................................................................3 C. Significance of the study.........................................................................................................4 D. Scope and Limitations.............................................................................................................4 II. Review of related literature..........................................................................................................5 A. Policy issues............................................................................................................................5 B. Theoretical issues....................................................................................................................7 C. Empirical Issues......................................................................................................................9 D. Research gap........................................................................................................................11 III. References................................................................................................................................14

I. Introduction

A. Statement of research question

There have been lots of questions in terms of the affectivity of educational systems and population control in the Philippines. The issues that this study sought to answer were the affectivity of policies imposed by the government and how great can it affect the problems that the country faces. Indeed, many people believed that age and education do contribute to the economic performance of the country both in the short run and in the long run. Moreover, there are also uncertainties whether age can affect students willingness to study and received formal education.

B. Objectives The study aims to examine the impact of age and education to the economic condition of the households, which can be classified under low-income households in the Philippine setting. Moreover, this study also look into the policies proposed and implemented by the government in the previous years and assess how effective are these policies in facing problems regarding education and population. Also, this study also aims to assess the relationship of age and education, and examine whether they are simultaneously affected by each other that would also take part in the economic performance of the country.

C. Significance of the study Since this study deals with examining the present issues on age and education by looking at those previous policies implemented in the country, It will indeed help those policy makers in arriving at better decisions that would benefit the country people as well. By knowing what are the suggested age gap for children and if education should be the top priority of families, this paper could come up with suggestions on how poverty-stricken families could improve their standard of living or escape poverty. Moreover, this paper will also help policy makers to understand the importance of having the right selection and making the right decision for policy making. Thus, students from all social classes, especially those students who are deprived of having the right education can benefit from this research paper.

D. Scope and Limitations This study will focus on the effectiveness of the policies of the government and check if age affects the motivation of the child to be educated. The study does not look into account the personal character of individuals as well as their family background or culture that may affect their study behaviour. However, this study assumes that there are no major economic shocks happening in the economy that may alter the effectiveness of the policy implemented. In addition to that, since the survey would only be conducted on the community of Leveriza, Malate Manila, the result of this study would most likely be as accurate as it is, be similar to communities that are likewise to Leveriza.

II. Review of related literature

A. Policy issues Education According to the 1987 Philippine constitution, education has the highest budgetary priority. It also states that education should be accessible to everyone. However, even education is accessed by everyone, it is not guaranteed that the quality of education is sufficient or follows the world standard. According to an article of World Bank (2003) the government has reviewed the education system and came up with recommendations. First is the Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM) of 1991. Second, the Philippines Education Sector Study (PESS) of 1998. And third, the Presidential Commission on Educational Reform (PCER) in 2000. For the recommendations, EDCOM came up with an efficient system where the elementary, secondary and technical & vocational education which will be handled by Department of Education, commission on Higher Education (CHED) and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) respectively. PESS and PCER recommended other policies, some of them includes financing for a better quality of education, providing access at all levels for poor households, and improvement of the overall sector management. There are issues regarding the implementation of policies. There have been reports that the subsidized school equipment, facilities and supplies have not reached their destination. Even though the government provides subsidies to the education of underprivileged families, it still cannot capture the entire population because it is too

large for the government to cover. Also, as what the reports have shown, governments have to ensure efficiencies in fulfilling their tasks. According to Key Issues in Philippine Education by ph.net there are major issues regarding education. These issues are: quality, affordability, budget and mismatch. The low quality of education is shown in the national assessment tests. Access to education is somehow limited to families that are financially capable. For the budget, the Philippines has one of the lowest budget allocation among ASEAN countries. Lastly, there is a mismatch between the educational training and available job opportunities, hence causing structural unemployment. Age In the Philippines, there are laws corresponding to minimum age requirements for education, employment, marriage and criminal responsibility. There is an order, the Department of Education Order 65 which states that there is a certain age where the child can enter grade one which is 6 years old. This situation leaves the child to enter the secondary level of education at eleven and finish it at fifteen years old. According to RA 7658 an Act Prohibiting the Employment of children below 15 years of Age in Public and Private Undertaking, children below 15 years old are forbidden to work. However, there may be instances that children might work due to public entertainment, the employer should process a contract with DOLE (Department of Labor and Employment) and assure that the child is safe.

When the couples age are still below twenty-one, they are subject to parental consent for marriage. The respective parents of the couple should agree with the marriage. The minimum age for criminal responsibility in the Philippines is fifteen years old and this is according to RA 9344. Children below fifteen are exempted from any criminal liability. If the child is above fifteen and below 18, there is somehow an exemption but there is an intervention program.

B. Theoretical issues Historically, the World Bank analyzes what determines education and what impacts education has on our society and to individuals. It is important to determine outcomes of educational investment for the creation of human capitals. The primary objective of economics of education is to recognize opportunities for better efficiency, equity and quality of education. It also aims to promote effective education reform process by the knowledge gained from analyzing what drives education outcomes and result by understanding how to strengthen the links of education systems with the labor market, building and supporting a network of education (World Bank). Education is a locomotive of growth depending on the quality of education. Economists consider education as both consumer and capital good because it provides efficacies to students as consumers and serves as an input to the labor market since it increases the productivity of the labor force that caters to better production of goods and services. As a capital good, education can be used to develop the human capital needed for economics and achieve for social transformation. It is widely accepted that

education helps improve the general standard of living in a society since development of skills is an important factor in production activities (Olaniyan & Okemakinde, 2008). According to the human capital theory, the economic development of a nation is a function of the quality of its education. It means that better quality of education will give rise to higher economic development that is to be experienced by the country. Since the world today heavily puts emphasis on knowledge society, quality of education now plays a big role in enhancing the potentiality of the labor force. Thus, investment in human capital is needed for international competitiveness in globalized setting. (Meinardus, 2003) Human capital theory highlights how education raises the efficiency and productivity of workers by increasing the level of cognitive stocks of economically productive human capability, which is a product of inherent abilities and investment in human beings. The provision of formal education is seen as a productive investment in human capital, which the proponents of the theory have considered as equally worthwhile as that of physical capital. (Olaniyan & Okemakinde, 2008) The table below shows the numerical values for the measurement related to education. Average of attending the school in the Philippines is around 8.2 years. This value means that average Filipino attend the school until their second year of high school. It also means that average Filipino leaves school during their high school years. But this value is higher than the duration of compulsory education which is 7years. This explains 97 % of the completion of elementary school for the Filipino. From the table below, money spent on education is really low. This explains why the percentage of perusing secondary level is only 52.6%.

Average years of schooling of adults Children out of school, primary and secondary Children out of school are the number of primary-school-age children not enrolled in primary or secondary school. Source: UNESCO Duration of compulsory education Number of grades or years that a child must legally be enrolled in school Source: World Development indicators database. Education spending (%of GDP) Government education expenditure (% of GDP, 2000-2002) Source: UNESCO Education spending (% of total government expenditure) Public educational expenditure as a percent of overall government expenditure United Nations Human Development Programme Education, primary completion rate Source: UNHDP Enrolment ratio > Secondary level Net enrolment ratio, secondary level, is the ratio of the number of children of official secondary school age enrolled in school to the number of children of official secondary school age in the population Source: UNESCO UIS Data, UNESCO institution for statistics Tertiary enrollment gross enrolment ratio, tertiary level is the sum of all tertiary level students enrolled at the start of the school year, expressed as a percentage of the mid-year population in the 5 year ago group after the official secondary school leaving age. source: UNESCO Institution of Statistics Literacy rate, adult female >% of females ages 15 and above Literacy rate, adult male >% of males ages 15 and above C. Empirical Issues

8.2 646,449

7 years

3.1%

17.8%

97 52.6%

31.2%

92.65% 92.54%

Since 1980s, Philippines has asserted a higher educational standards that promotes democracy for over a century (Ordonez, 2009). In fact, as more countries experience higher educational growth rates, it is expected that the Philippines should also experience such trend. However, it is quite disappointing that the Philippines failed to undergo such increase in the enrollment rates during those years. Maybe, problems arising from urging families to let their children undergo formal education have already existed during that time. Either the problems were of financial, personal facet in the consumers perspective or the inappropriate policy implementations in the

macroeconomic view, it is still important for the country to identify the leading factors that brought to this very small percentage change in enrollment rates during that time. Moreover, one of the Ordonezs (2009) studies have also found that the results from examinations shown that Philippine graduates seem to be ill-prepared during their licensure examinations, while feedbacks from the workplace also revealed that these newly graduates failed to meet the workforce demands of the global market. Besides, these issues may show that there is a need for the Philippines to modify the educational system in the country. It is believed that the Philippines have gone through higher educational development compared to other Asian neighbour countries during the early times (Ordonez, 2009). Yet, based from World Data on Education supported by UNESCO, it shows that the Philippines always perform poorly in almost all fields of education in the recent years (International Bureau of Education, 2011). In fact, the Philippines has always been accounted for several government reform programs that help make education more accessible to all, which aims to smoothen one of the program Education for All (EFA) for the 2015 Goal (Caoli-Rodriguez, 2007). Over the

years, government has been trying to campaign for better education to the household by providing different forms of financial support for the households, especially to those people belong to lower social class. Specific strategies, plans, government policy reforms, and the likes have been simultaneously carried out; but as of the data shown in 2009, Philippines is still place below the standard level. These show that there exist educational reform deficiencies until present times, which may also have a big impact on the educational development of the Philippines in the coming years. In another paper presented by Capuno, J. J. (2009), the study aims to improve the overall educational systems and human development of the Philippines through government policies and decentralization of authorities to local government units. As mentioned in this article, they believe that decentralizing fiscal and administrative power to local government units and school-level authorities would generate more effective and efficient implementations of policies for students since it is assumed that the local government units and school heads are the ones who would know more about the needs of those students. Moreover, decentralizations can also help improve information asymmetries since these local government units could respond more quickly to the needs of these households. On the other hand, it is also uncertain whether

decentralization could have positive or negative effects to the educational reforms implemented. These problems of decentralization may arise due to the incapabilities, biases, inefficiencies, and dishonesty of these local governments.

D. Research gap

There are a lot of reasons why the current economy still suffers from poverty and inefficient take-off for development. Many research papers and findings tried to explain the reason why this is happening, though it also sets that overpopulation and education are some of the problems or reasons why the country still suffers and could not move on from its current state. As mentioned above, the government has been trying to develop new policies, which could help improve current issues on education and population, which are crucial for the country to unravel poverty issues. Moreover, since education can be considered as consumption and investment both at the same time, it is important for the country to focus and invest more on the quality of education that the students receive. However, this assumption of education as consumption and investment depends on how the study views it. Empirically, there are already problems in the demand of the global market for skilled worker in the country. Hence, these disparities between the demand and supply of skilled laborers will lead to structural unemployment in the long run. The direct relationship between age and education within the country is still uncertain. In fact, there is no exact evidence showing how age can affect the number of people going to school. For the Philippines, its households have different views on education. Some view education as an investment, while others view it as a form of burden to their family. Also, some families, due to having a close age gaps among children, it hinders some of the sibling to have a formal education. On the other hand, there are some cases wherein people are bothered by their age that hindered them from going to school. This shows that age has uncertain effects on the willingness of an individual to attend formal education. When trying to look upon issues on education,

maybe a small proportion of them arise from age gap between people who are qualified and who are not qualified to receive formal education. Hence, the effect of age gap to education in the current macroeconomic perspective is still ambiguous on how it would affect the future economic development of the country.

III. References Caoli-Rodriguez, R. B. (2007). The Philippines Country Case Study. Retrieved from United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization: http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0015/001555/155516e.pdf Capuno, J. J. (2009). A Case Study of the Decentralization of Health and Education Service in the Philippines. Retrieved from Human Development Network: http://hdn.org.ph/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/dp03_capuno.pdf International Bureau of Education. (2011). Retrieved from United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization: http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/Publications/WDE/2010/pdfversions/Philippines.pdf NationMaster - World Statistics, Country Comparisons. (n.d.). Education in Philippines: Statistics (269 stats available). Retrieved July 1, 2012, from http://www.nationmaster.com/country/rp-philippines/edu-education/ Ordonez, V. a. (2009). Accreditation in the Philippines: A Case Study. Retrieved from Victor Ordonez: https://docs.google.com/viewer? a=v&q=cache:n1ALNjIeLckJ:www.victorordonez.com/downloads/readvictor/Phil_Accreditation_rev_7dn.doc+case+study+education+Philippines&hl=en &pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESg6cit3V17oDYIFwuKf3VVYzP4fiK_FAmNWzm7KPDmj9 2PusAVcgJyHrjtP4LJvjk7W Olaniyan. D.A & Okemakinde. T. (2008). Human Capital Theory: Implications for Educational Development. Ibadan: EuroJournals Publishing, Inc. Retrieved July 1, 2012, from http://www.eurojournals.com/ejsr_24_2_01.pdf Right to Education. (n.d.). National law and policies on minimum ages Philippines | Right to Education. Retrieved July 1, 2012, from http://www.right-toeducation.org/country-node/488/country-minimum Ronald Meinardus. (2003). The Crisis of Public Education in the Philippines. Business World Internet Edition. http://www.fnf.org.ph/liberalopinion/crisis-public-education-philippines.htm

World Bank. (n.d.). Education - Economics of Education. Retrieved July 1, 2012, from http://go.worldbank.org/78EK1G87M0 World Bank. (n.d.). Regaining an Educational Advantage - Investing in the Philippines Economic Future. Retrieved July 1, 2012, from http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPHILIPPINES/Resources/DB18EducationPolicyNote-July13.pdf http://www.ph.net/htdocs/education/issue.htm