ACHIEVING UNIVERSAL PRIMARY EDUCATION: EFFECTIVE IMPLEMENTATION IN MANDAUE CITY ____________________________________ A Thesis Proposal Presented to the Department of Political Science School of Law and Governance University of San Carlos Cebu City, Philippines _______________________________ In Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree Bachelor of Arts major in Political Science (Public Management and Development) ___________________________________ By BEA B. SUAN March 2012
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ACHIEVING UNIVERSAL PRIMARY EDUCATION: EFFECTIVE IMPLEMENTATION IN MANDAUE CITY
____________________________________
A Thesis ProposalPresented to the
Department of Political ScienceSchool of Law and Governance
University of San CarlosCebu City, Philippines
_______________________________
In Partial Fulfilmentof the Requirements for the Degree
Bachelor of Arts major in Political Science(Public Management and Development)
___________________________________
By
BEA B. SUAN
March 2012
APPROVAL SHEET
This thesis entitled Achieving Universal Primary Education: Effective Implementation in Mandaue City prepared by Bea B Suan in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree BACHELOR OF ARTS major in POLITICAL SCIENCE – PUBLIC MANAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT has been examined and is recommended for acceptance and approval for ORAL EXAMINATION.
THESIS COMMITTEE
BRENETTE ABRENICA, M. Pol.Sci, MAPAAdviser
GRACE C. MAGALZO, M.Pol.Sci., LLB FERDINAND S. BONCAYAO, MM, LLBMember Member
RHODERICK JOHN S. ABELLANOSA, M.Pol.Sci., M.A. Phil.Member
PANEL OF EXAMINERS
Approved by the Committee on Oral Examination with the grade of __________
RHODERICK JOHN S. ABELLANOSA, M.Pol.Sci., M.A. Phil.Chair of the Defense Committee
GRACE C. MAGALZO, M.Pol.Sci., LLB FERDINAND S. BONCAYAO, MM, LLBMember Member
JIAH L. SAYSON, M.A.Adviser
Accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree BACHELOR OF ARTS major in POLITICAL SCIENCE – PUBLIC MANAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT.
RODERIC R. POCA, M.Pol.Sci.., LLB Chair, Department of Political Science School of Law and Governance
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
Rationale of the Study
Education together with the other aspects of life, such as health, environment as well as
economic dimension is one of the contributing factors of development. Through time, education
was considered as the most significant factor among all aspects. The role of education is so
encompassing that its benefits were over spilled throughout the other phases of life. Combined
with sound macroeconomic policies, education is fundamental for the construction of globally
competitive and democratic societies. Education is a key in creating, applying, and spreading
new ideas and technologies which in turn are critical for sustained growth; it augments cognitive
and other skills, which in turn increase labor productivity, and improving these aspects would
make development possible (Bruns, Mingat, and Rakotomalala 2003, 1). Even our grandparents
had always reminded us that there is nothing more important wealth that their children could
inherit from them other than education.
With the significance of education in every one’s life, government had been making
policies that would encourage children to go to school and learn. Since before, various states had
been making compact with each other, thereby committing themselves to pursue the goals
relating education by creating policies for an international implementation. And this compact
was formed since the 1990 World Conference on Education for All in Jomtien, Thailand,
followed by the World Education Forum in Dakar towards the 2000 Millenium Development
Goals to be achieved by the year 2015. All of these conventions may differ in its timeframe.
However, they are one in their commitment to achieve an education for all or recently known as
universal education by the Millennium Development Goals. This policies were crafted
internationally, nevertheless includes the implementation in the regional or local level since it is
a worldwide goal. However, in the Philippines studies by UNDP had showed that goal number
two of Millennium Development Goals which is achieving universal primary education is one of
the three goals which are still at the low level of implementation in the Philippines. It means that
Philippines are at a snail’s pace in its drive in achieving universal education and improving its
quality. Eradicating poverty and environmental goals were the primary purpose of the
government leaving education behind. In this light, this study aims to evaluate the
implementation of Millennium Development Goals at the city level by looking into its initiatives
that intends to response to this developmental goals and how sound these initiatives in the
achievement of the goal.
Theoretical Background
Education
Since before, education is a concept that holds the foundation of all other rights,
opportunities and enjoyment. Education is almost at the same age of the people born at time of
civilization. Hence, it’s been part of our culture that we must always treasure. It is a fundamental
human right; perhaps the most human of all human rights because it is reading and writing that
sets human beings most apart from other creatures (Delamonica, et a l., 2001). It was viewed as
an integral part of the over-all human development. Or, as Margaret Akpomi (2009) puts it,
” Education is undisputedly recognized as the bedrock of any meaningful development.” It was
well said in many policies, agreements and international conventions since 1940’s. It is a great
independent variable (Kingston, et al., 2003), because it stands on its own and sends an impact
towards all aspects of human development. Almost all professionals in different fields and
disciplines recognized education as an essential part of progress. Most common of all
understanding is that, education could address poverty reduction and can help achieve economic
growth by providing economic benefits. As what Cohen and others (2005) had said that, “Over
the past century, there are three approaches advocated to escape the consequences of widespread
poverty as well as rapid economic growth and environmental problems.” These three approaches
were identified and differentiated as:
The bigger pie approach says: use technology to produce more and to alleviate
shortages. The fewer forks approach says: make contraception and reproductive
health care available to eliminate unwanted fertility and to slow
population growth. The better manners approach says: eliminate violence
and corruption; improve the operation of markets and government provision
of public goods; reduce the unwanted after-effects of consumption;
and achieve greater social and political equity between young and old,
male and female, rich and poor (Cohen, 1995).
Cohen (2005), had also implied that in this approaches the need of achieving education
whether formal or not is necessary to support the aforementioned approaches. Nevertheless,
education does not only help economic growth but brings as well political and social stability
through proper knowledge of governance and leadership. Coming from its premise as basic
human rights, it encompasses not just economic, social and political but all aspects of life that
could either benefit or not the person possessing it.
FROM “EDUCATION FOR ALL” TOWARDS “MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS”
The first part had showed the significance of education in order to achieve other human
rights. Unfortunately, despite of its laid importance it seems education was undermined not just
by individuals but even with the larger scope, which is the government. This problem which we
currently have in this present system is not a brand new dilemma. Hence, this has emerged past
centuries from today. That is why, the goals of achieving an education for all is not somewhat
new because since before this goal has been on the international agenda such as in Universal
Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 which was aiming for a free and compulsory education to
all the children (EFA Global Monitoring Report, 2005). It was reaffirmed through time as a set
of goals in some conventions and agreements which may only have some revisions and
amendments. Few years after the 1948 UDHR setting of goals in achieving education, the
commitment towards this has been reaffirmed throughout the time until the present through the
different forums and agendas,
In 1990, the World Declaration on Education for All
noted that the generally poor quality of education
needed to be improved and recommended that
education be made both universally available and
more relevant. A decade later, the Dakar Framework for Action
declared that access to quality education was the
right of every child…. Through the MDGs, the international community has
reaffirmed its commitment to achieve universal primary education by the year 2015 (EFA Global
Monitoring Report 2005, 27-29)
Furthermore, supported by Birdsall and Vaishnav,”the practice of setting goals for
universal primary education is not a new phenomenon”. Beginning in 1934 with the International
Conference on Public Education in Geneva, developed and developing countries have repeatedly
pledged to “leave no child behind” by promising that boys and girls the world round would be
given the opportunity to enjoy the privilege of basic education. Unfortunately with all these plans
made, actions are missing and progress is invisible. It had only experienced growth in theories
but not in practice. In this study, Millennium Development Goals would be assessed considering
the fact that it is the present setting of goals emerging from the previous commitments of
Education for All. Specifically, this study would focus on the achievement of goal number 2
which is the universal primary education. As well as with the other goals in the MDG,
prioritizing education has been set since the previous commitments to development. In the
Millennium Development Goal 2, achieving a universal primary education by 2015 was at a low
level in most countries specifically of poor countries.
That is why stronger commitments by every state must be made with these goals in order
to implement and achieve this all within the allotted time of achievement and in order to
experience development. It is only through deep evaluation of the methods and strategies used
that could bring out this goals. Locally developed strategies, based on national consultation and
participation through representative political structures, accountable and capacitated institutions
and adequately incentivized public servants are the key to effective implementation of MDG
strategies and policies. (UNDP, 2010) Thus, achieving MDG by 2015 is possible if only equality
and commitment in the implementation will take at hand.
INIATIVES IN MDG IMPLEMENTATION
It is learned from the previous part the importance of education and the failures of the
government to implement development goals towards education. Hence, this crisis had led to
many scholars and researchers to conduct a study examining the different areas of education.
Significance studies related to education emerged from this framework of Millennium
Development Goals covering the different aspects of education.
Studies such as of Colclough and Al-Samarrai( 2000) focused on the public spending of
education in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. They argued that schooling for all is achievable
even in the poorest countries provided that governments are willing to reform both the private
and public costs and efficiency of school systems. Moreover, related studies and reports about
education also exists such as those studies focusing on the assessment of the relationship
between public education spending and education outcomes at the primary school level (Al-
Samarrai, 2003),financing capacity development between countries in Asia(Briones,),analyzing
emerging approaches, strategies and experiences of investing in local government in the
Philippines(Briones),return to investments in education through human development theory
(Pshacaropoulos, et al., 2001), improving the measurement of educational attainment for a broad
group of countries(Barro and Lee, 2000), updating the global and regional cost estimates for
achieving EFA by 2015(Delamonica, 2001), fast -track initiative as an approach for donor
financing the low-income countries(Birdsall and Vaishnav, 2005) and the profitability of
investment in education (Psacharopoulos.). These are the studies which discussed and assessed
how universal education in different areas could be achieved by looking or studying specific
factors or aspects of education and of development.
Among all of these is the study that is the most relevant with this paper crafted in the
same setting but having a different focus. The study by Professor Leonor Briones from the
National College of Public Administration and Governance which focused on the experiences of
the Philippines as part of the localization of MDG in Asian countries. Though it studies the
localization of the policy, nevertheless it implicitly assess the implementation of MDG in the
Philippines by looking into its approaches and strategies. It studies the local capacity
development investments for the MDG localization in the Philippines. Its objectives was to
review and analyze the emerging approaches, strategies and experiences of investing in local
government capacity development in the Philippines and to provide initial data towards
establishing a baseline of current investments in local CD in the Philippines. According to
Professor Briones,” Philippine culture places high value on education as the key not only to
personal advancement but to national development as well.” The status ascribed to education is
also evident in the recognition of the importance of training and CD.” That is why; in the
gathering of evidence it tries to examine different phases in the implementation of this MDG at
the local level. It tries to examine the trends in decentralization of decision-making, the
increasing amounts of ODA being channeled through general budget support mechanisms, the
increasing in-country inequalities at the local level and the role of effective and accountable local
governments in meeting the MDG goals. This study includes two cities as case studies
specifically NueveEcija and Bulacan as suggested by UNDP Bangkok. Donor country was also
chosen, which combine resources to directly finance a portion of the recipient governments’
education budgets, instead of each financing many separate, sometimes small
“projects.”(Birdsall and Vaishnav 2005,257). Her study, since focused on the local capacity
development entails the participation of government agencies and institutions. In the end, it was
concluded that the importance of capacity development has long been recognized for the
achievement of social and economic development in the Philippines and the MDG as a global
commitment had increased the role of the capacity development. In the end of her study it
produces a demand in the Philippines which is by the advent of regionalization and
decentralization has increased the responsibilities of local government units for the delivery of
basic services especially of health and education.
However, these study though it involves localization and the assessment of the
government’s method of implementation which is the same with this paper but differs
specifically on its specific objectives. While it studies the implementation and the localization of
MDG as a whole, this paper would specifically assess the implementation of MDG goal number
2 which is achieving universal primary education in Mandaue City. Professor Briones research
encompasses the focus of this paper since her study is a general assessment of MDG being
localized and implemented in the Philippines. Nevertheless, as this study would assess the
implementation of goal number 2, it implicitly evaluate the effectiveness of their implementation
by particularly looking into the educational projects or programs initiated in order to address the
need and importance of education especially of the primary education, which is the basic of all.
Proclaimed by the Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, “Education
programmes should be designed to promote the full development of the human personality and
strengthen respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.”
Professor Briones studies examined the capacity development of local government units
in the implementation of MDG as a whole, however in this paper; it focuses on the mere
implementation of MDG particularly highlighting goal number two which is to achieve a
universal primary education by 2015. This paper would center on the implementation of MDG
focusing on the service delivery of education by identifying the initiatives of the city in order to
respond on what has been provided in the goal. This study would specifically identifies the
educational programs and projects made by the city from the year before and after MDG had set
its foot in the ground, its goals or objectives, methods and respondents in order to compare and
to determine the improvement of this goal by looking through its indicators, in terms of the
number of primary students enrolled in two phases of time, the proportion of pupils starting
grade 1 who reach grade 5, and as well as the literacy rate of 15-24 years old. This study is
different from others since it does it not only studies the over-all localization and implementation
but looks into the micro-level of implementation of policy which could contribute to the
achievement of a universal primary education. From the Millennium Development Goals, goal
number 2 which is achieving universal primary education targeted that by 2015, children
everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling with
the indicators and to eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably
by 2005, and at all levels of education no later than 2015. (Bruns, et al., 2003). Moreover, the
attainment of universal primary education depends even more crucially on education system
reform than an incremental financing. So this paper would serve to be a contributing study and
assessment to the implementation of Millennium Development Goal. Based from the assessment
done by UNDP, achieving universal primary education is one of the 3 goals which are still are at
the low level of implementation. Nevertheless, other country such as Africa was keener on
implementing goal number 2 as a step to address poverty. Education for all coming from MDG
was now slowly crawling towards the agenda of the Philippine government. Along with
“Education for All”, the Philippines is also committed to pursue eight time bound and specific
targets under the Millennium Declaration which it signed on September 2000. The Declaration,
in general, aims to reduce poverty by half in 2015(22.65 percent proportion of the population
below poverty incidence and 12.15 percent below subsistence incidence by 2015). With the
adoption of the Declaration, the Philippines likewise affirmed its commitment to the Millennium
Development Goals (MDG) geared towards reducing poverty, hunger, diseases, illiteracy,
environmental degradation and discrimination against women. These goals have been
mainstreamed in the country’s Medium Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP) 2004-
2010 including policies and plans related to children, access to primary education and gender
equality.(Philippine Education For All Report). Education was not strongly implemented but
nevertheless the commitment of the Philippines with EFA will serve as a stepping stone in
further achieving universal primary education. Explicitly, while this paper focuses on the
implementation in terms of the service delivery it examines as well how strong is the local
government and public officials in the implementation of this goal and what methods or
approaches they had took in order to achieve this. The findings of this study may be used as topic
for the next paper who wishes to study and focus on education as the fundamental right and way
for development.
Theoretical/Conceptual Framework
DAKAR and MDG FRAMEWORk
The goals set and being laid in the different agendas comes from the need to address
poverty. Thus, these goals must be implemented and act out in the realm in order to solve the
dilemma which is reduce poverty as a whole and to achieve over-all development. These goals
should not remain on papers but be seen upon the outside of it. With these, frameworks are made
in order to commit every state to do an action to all the goals being known. One of the prominent
frameworks when it comes to the achievement of the developmental goals is the Dakar
Framework. This framework is a collective commitment to action made by the participants of the
World Education Forum held in Dakar, Senegal in April, 2000. It posits the obligation of the
National Governments for ensuring the Education for All goals and targets to be reached and
sustained, which is a responsibility that can be met most effectively through broad-based
partnerships within countries, supported by co-operation with regional and international agencies
and
institutions. Dakar would commit theirselves to act the following goals:
Expanding and improving comprehensive early childhood care and education,
especially for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged of children
Ensuring that all children, with special emphasis on girls – including the
poorest, working children and children with special needs - complete a good
quality primary education by 2015.
Ensuring that the learning needs of all young people are met through equitable
access to appropriate learning and life skills programmes.
Providing equitable access to basic and continuing education programmes for
adults, and achieving at least a 50 per cent reduction in current gender
disparities within a decade.
Eliminating gender disparities in primary and secondary education by 2005, as
a milestone towards achieving gender equality in education programmes,
institutions and systems by 2015.
Improving all aspects of the quality of education so that recognised and
measurable learning outcomes are achieved, especially in literacy, numeracy
and essential life skills. (World Education Forum 2000,iii)
Dakar Framework tends to commit their actions toward these goals and use these goals as
well in assessing the implementation of every state. Nevertheless, as we are on the 21 st century
having these new developmental goals which are the Millennium Development Goals, we are
committing ourselves to the new framework that it had made. We assess development
specifically through MDG’s achievement within the span of time it plans to achieve. Using its
own goals, targets and indicators, determining the development of a country would be easy,
though in truth it’s difficult to take.Considering the fact, that there have been an existing
frameworks in the commitment of action with the aforementioned goals, it would be best to use a
policy- analysis framework considering that in every agendas no matter how they seems to be
in convergence , there have been differences in some aspects of its goals. Thus, analysing the
policy in all its phases would help in understanding how government institutions act and
implement the policies, what are their initiatives, do they really address the achievement of
goals, what are their methods, is it compatible with the goals, and so on. Using the framework of
policy-analysis and focusing in the implementation aspect, the flow of the study will be:
Goals/ Odjectives Respondents
Methods
MDG
GOAL 2
IMPLEMENTATION
ASSESSING IMPACT
SATISFACTORY
UNSATISFACTORY
INITIATIVES
Educational Programs/Projects
FIG. 1. Flow of the Research Process
\\
1 Statistical Data from the City Government; analyze and evaluate
2 Interview the Participants to assess the effectiveness of implementation
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Psacharopoulos, George, and Harry Anthony Patrinos. "Returns to Investment in Education: A
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