LOCAL LITERATURE

Primary Education: Barriers to Entry and Bottlenecks to Completion

School infrastructure

Classroom and school building shortages in the school system continue to be a problem
especially given the country’s fast-growing school population. While budgets have not been sufficient to
provide the entire infrastructure needed, a number of different measures have been put in place to deal
with shortfalls. These include multigrade schools, incomplete schools, and shifting of classes in
congested regions. A number of incomplete schools were included in the sample for the qualitative
investigation. Field results suggest that the risk of eventual dropout from primary school among their
students appear higher. These schools are usually in sparsely populated areas; they are small facilities
with little funding and only a handful of teachers. Typically they are a significant distance away from the
nearest complete school, which means students who run out of grade levels to take in their local school
will have to travel far to continue. A couple of schools visited only go up to Grade 2 and 3, according to
the teachers most of their students never continue beyond those grades because they would have to
travel down a mountain by foot for more than an hour to get to the nearest complete school. The extent
of coverage shortages for elementary schools should be assessed in order to properly prioritize areas
where additional resources are necessary and where it would be prudent to either expand incomplete
schools, or provide other means of support to get students to schools that are far away from their
homes. In congested areas the problem is different: having too many students in a school with too-few
classrooms poses a significant problem for many schools in large cities. Multi-shift classes have been
used as a stopgap measure since 2004 for addressing shortages in classrooms in heavily populated
areas. Such an arrangement condenses the school day and consequently, the curriculum contents, into a
shorter period of time. While there has been no empirical evidence indicating suffering student
achievements as a result of multi-shifting, it is reasonable to hypothesize that rushing through the
curriculum presents stresses to children in the learning situation (Caoli-Rodriguez, 2007).

As of the 2009-10 school year, an alarming 94% of students (89% of schools) in NCR are enrolled
in schools with multi-shift classes. The rest of the country doesn’t have the same problem, although
there is a sizeable portion of students in nearby CALABARZON in the same situation (27% of students,
7% of schools). This has essentially remained unchanged since 2005-06 when 93% of students in NCR
and 22% of students in CALABARZON were in multi-shift schools. For these two areas with classroom
shortages, there appears to be some association with late entry into schools, especially in NCR. While
41% of children in single-shift schools are overaged for Grade 1, the corresponding percentage in multi-
shift schools is 52%. In Grade 2 the difference is between 49% and 58% (SY 2009-10 BEIS). The difference
in overaged children is smaller in CALABARZON, 54% vs 57% in Grade 1 and 60%vs 63% in Grade 2, but
the pattern is the same. The same general pattern is evident for a similar indicator, the pupil-classroom
ratio (PCR). Nationally, in schools with PCR above 45, 60% of students in Grade 1 are overaged, while in
schools with PCR below or at 45 it is 55%. At the 2nd grade the difference is smaller, although the
percentage of overaged children is higher, between 67% and 64%. According to NCR principals and
teachers, students in double-shift classes have about 1-2 hours less instructional time per day compared
to those in single-shift ones depending on grade level. Those in triple-shift classes have a total of 4 hours
of instruction per day, 3 hours less than single-shift classes depending on grade level. Essentially as an
entire region, NCR students get significantly fewer hours of instruction per year compared to students in
the rest of the country. Teachers try to fill in some teaching for students who cannot keep up with the
pace by offering remedial lessons for an hour or two after class, only with a select set of students. Even
the scope and scale of these remedial teaching sessions depends on classroom availability. The most
urgent need in congested regions that adopt the shifting policy is to eliminate triple shifting because of
the large number of instructional hours lost over the school year. As for double shifts, additional
research is necessary to determine other forms of auxiliary instructional support that may efficiently
make up for the shortage of teaching time, perhaps in the form of additional at-home work, workbooks,
learning aides and the like, and the Modified In- School and Off-School Approach (MISOSA) currently in
place.

REFERENCE

David, Clarissa C. and Albert, Jose Ramon G. (March 2012). Primary Education: Barriers to Entry and
Bottlenecks to Completion .Discussion Paper Series No. 2012-07

Improvement of the Competencies of Early Childhood Education Teachers in Bicol Region Through
Training

Socio-demographic profile, teaching methods, strategies used and training needs of Early Child
Preschool Teachers (PSTs) and Day Care Workers (DCWs) in Region V (Camarines Sur, Camarines Norte,
and Albay) were studied. The level of improvement in the teaching competencies of PSTs and DCWs in
Camarines Sur before and after the capability enhancement training was determined. Half of the PSTs
were young (19 -30 years old). Almost all (92.5%) of PSTs are female. Half are married and half are single
in status. Their monthly salary ranged from Php 3,000.00- Php 4,000.00. All of them finished college but
lack specialization in early childhood education. Half of them had one to three years teaching
experience. Contrary to the above findings, the DCWs belonged to the middle-age group (31-40 years
old). Most of them are female and married. More than half of them received Php 1,000.00 – Php
2,000.00 monthly honorarium and are college graduates who lack early childhood education units. The
rest are college undergraduate, high school graduate and high school undergraduate. More than half
have worked as DCW for seven to 15 years and above. Early education teachers used demonstration
method and behavioral modeling. Computer assisted instruction was never used. Their training needs
were on framing behavioral objectives, lesson planning, teaching methodologies, development of
instructional materials, and skills in music, arts and drama. Both PSTs and DCWs have fair level of
teaching competency (LTC) and have developing level of teachers professional development (LTPD)
along lesson planning, teaching methodologies and development of instructional materials before the
training except for framing behavioral objectives among PSTs which was satisfactory and skills in music,
arts and drama among DCWs was satisfactory. The LTC of PSTs and DCWs in all teaching competencies
was high and have expert level of LTPD after the training except for lesson planning among DCWs which
was satisfactory. Significant differences were observed in the level of improvement in all teaching
competencies of PSTs and DCWs after the training.
 Training needs of PST’s and DCW’S in Camarines Sur, Camarines Norte and Albay

 Framing Behavioral Objectives

 Lesson Planning
 Teaching Methodologies
 Development of Instructional Materials
 Skills in Music, Arts and Drama

Level of Teaching Competency (LTC) and Level of Teacher Professional Development (LTPD)

Before the training, the level of teaching competencies of PST’s on framing behavioral objectives
was satisfactory and the level of teacher professional development was experienced. While the level of
teaching competency in lesson planning, teaching methodologies, development of instructional
materials and skills in music, arts & drama was fair. The level of teacher professional development
(LTPD) along these competencies was developing. On the other hand, before the training the level
teaching competency of DCW’s on framing behavioral objectives, lesson planning, teaching
methodologies, and development of instructional material was fair. Their LTPD was developing. It was
noted that only music, arts and drama have satisfactory level of teaching competency.

REFERENCES

Botor, S. B. & Osea, G. B.. (2014). Improvement of the Competencies of Early Childhood Education
Teachers in Bicol Region Through Training. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, Arts and Sciences, 1(1).
Retrieved from http://ejournals.ph/form/cite.php?id=5672

Review of the Policies and Practices in the Implementation of the K to 12 Music Curriculum

In this article, the author reviewed the current state of the K to 12 Music Curriculum of the
Department of Education after its initial implementation last school year 2014-2015. The focus of the
paper lies on the K to 12 Music Curriculum for the basic education, which includes its implications in the
higher education unit. In the infancy stage of the new music curriculum, there have been few researches
done which focuses on its implementation and administration of the said curriculum. At this point, there
were several challenges and disadvantages cited in the new K to 12 curriculums. In this study, the author
carefully analyzed the policies and practices of the new K to 12 Music subject. After the analysis of the
challenges and disadvantages in the revised curriculum, the author articulated suggestions for the
improvement of the policies and practices towards the development of the new curriculum. The music
and art curriculum focus on the learner as both as the recipient and instructor of the knowledge, skills
and values necessary for artistic expression and cultural literacy. The design of the curriculum is student
centered, based on spiral progression of processes, concepts and skills grounded in performance-based
learning. Thus, the learner is empowered, through active involvement and participation, to effectively
correlate music and art to the development of his/her own cultural identity and the expansion of his/her
peculiar vision of the world.
 REFERENCE

Labrador, J. F.. (2016). Review of the Policies and Practices in the Implementation of the K to 12 Music
Curriculum. MALAY, 28(2). Retrieved from http://ejournals.ph/form/cite.php?id=9872

Benchmarking the Practices of Teacher Education Institutions in Science Education

Based on the premise that quality education demands effective teachers, this qualitative-
quantitative study was pursued to determine the practices of Teacher Education Institutions (TEIs) that
are capable of effectively implementing the New Teacher Education Curriculum (NTEC). A total of 25 TEI
faculty and 68 pre service teachers from four (4) TEIs were the participants of the study. Standardized
concept tests, science process skills tests, attitudinaires, classroom observation protocol and interview
protocol were utilized in the study As a whole, enriched curricula and syllabi, a well implemented faculty
development program and strict admission policies are practices that can bring about the attainment of
the implemented curriculum. The practices which resulted in the attainment of the planned and
implemented curriculum are translated into policies and disseminated to all TEI’s in the country.

REFERENCE

Lupdag-Padama, E. A., BUNAGAN, A. B., Caingcoy, W. , Ceballos, H. P., Gallardo, A. C., LACUATA, F. C.,
LAMORENA, M. B., Navaza, D. C., Nueva Espana, R. C., Panganiban, M. S. & PILI, A. S.. (2009).
Benchmarking the Practices of Teacher Education Institutions in Science Education. The Magus, 1(1).
Retrieved from http://ejournals.ph/form/cite.php?id=322

Challenging Popular Assumptions on Teacher Education

The Revised Policies and Standards for the Undergraduate Teacher Education Curriculum,
articulated in CHED Memorandum Order No. 30 (CMO 30) in 2004, marks a significant curriculum reform
for teacher education in the Philippines. This paper examines the ideas and assumptions behind the
reform policies articulated in CMO 30, explore the theoretical basis of these assumptions within the
framework of levels of curriculum representation, and validate these assumptions from the perspective
of teacher educators and students in two selected teacher education institutions in Cebu City. Using a
researcher-made five-point scale, the respondents assessed a set of pre-specified assumptions on the
revised teacher education curriculum with regard to the extent to which these assumptions hold in their
teaching-learning environments. Results showed that the assumptions that had the highest perception
ratings among teacher educators and students revolved around the assessment of entry competence of
teacher education students; strengthening the connections between theory and teaching practice
through the Experiential Learning Courses; the use of the National Competency- Based Teacher
Standards (NCBTS) as basis for teaching practice; and the integration of theoretical principles, concepts
and methods in professional education courses. To validate these assumptions, respondents also
assessed their teaching-learning environments using a 7-point semantic differential based on bipolar
characteristics of conventional and constructivist learning environments in terms of the nature of
classes, the role of teachers and students, learning modes, instructional emphasis and assessment of
student learning. Results showed that teacher educators perceived their teaching-learning environment
as moving towards the constructivist while students perceived their environment as a mix of
conventional and constructivist. From the results, implications and challenges for curriculum
implementation and research are drawn as basis for recommending concrete actions towards the
delivery of teacher education programs based on reform efforts anchored on evidence from research.
Reforms in teacher education cannot be reviewed in isolation from the broader perspective of education
reform in the Philippines. Contended that reforms instituted and implemented at both national and local
levels are geared toward the attainment of efficiency and effectiveness, quality and excellence,
relevance and responsiveness & access and equity.

REFERENCE

Reston, E. & Dayagbil, F. T.. (2010). Challenging Popular Assumptions on Teacher Education. CNU Journal
of Higher Education, 4(1). Retrieved from http://ejournals.ph/form/cite.php?id=6162

Spatial analysis to identify disparities in Philippine public school facilities

In these article, geographic information systems were utilized to investigate the allocation of
public school resources and the extent of disparity in education facilities among 75 Philippine provinces.
Four clusters of the provinces were identified by applying spatial statistics and regionalization
techniques to the public school data. Overall, the building conditions are of high quality in the northern
provinces. The greater region of the capital is overcrowded but well maintained. The eastern seaboard
region and the southern provinces have poor conditions due to frequent natural calamities and the
prolonged civil unrest, respectively. Since the spatial analysis result shows that the school building
requirements are largely unmet, some recommendations are proposed so that they can be
implemented by the government in order to improve the school facilities and mitigate the existing
disparities among the four clusters of the Philippines. The Philippines implemented a nationwide reform
in its education system in June 2012. The main change was an increase of the pre-university education
cycle from 10 to 12 years. This transformation demanded a significant investment in the education
system’s human resources and facilities, which prompted the legislators to increase the education
budget in 2014 to 4.3% of the country’s gross domestic product. Although this has been the highest
allocation for education in the Philippines for more than 15 years, it still falls short of the UNESCO
standard of 6%  It is well known that basic school facilities in the country have been inadequate and
insufficient, with various media reports describing the dire situation at the start of every school year. A
survey of literature on the Philippine education facilities shows that a review of allocation policies and
continued monitoring of resources has been often advised but was not conducted by the Philippines’
Department of Education (DepEd) Philippine public education was designed to be decentralized and
financed by local governments when it was institutionalized during the American occupation (1898–
1946). However, it was later centralized due to the lack of local financial resources. The Monroe Survey
in 1925 disapproved of the excessive centralized control of public education in the country as it led to
less involvement from other sectors. Eventually, the decentralization was restored in 2001 through the
principal-led School Building Program. In this decentralized system, DepEd was responsible for the
management of nearly 60,000 schools across the country. Then the responsibilities of financing and
acquiring school sites in their territories were delegated to the municipalities and cities. Each school
district has a local school board composed of teachers and parents who decide on matters relating to
school funds and facilities. The main aim of this study is to address the issues that affect school building
conditions as a case study of the Philippines because only a few studies have been conducted and
therefore the understanding of the Philippines’ education environment is very limited. School building
conditions refer to the overall state of the school building facilities: its structural state as well as its
capacity compared with the student population that it serves. By utilizing various geographic
information systems (GIS) analysis tools on provincial level data, this research attempts to portray the
state of education facilities in geographical form and identify provincial patterns.

REFERENCE

Figueroa, L. L., Lim, S., & Lee, J. (2016). Investigating the relationship between school facilities and
academic achievements through geographically weighted regression. Annals of GIS, 1-13.
http://rsa.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21681376.2015.1099465

SYNTHESIS

Facility Building in terms of local literature classify all the few things and budget that cannot
accommodate by our government for the welfare of Filipino students hence future studies can look into
the effects of school facilities on education outcomes as well as its effects on the local community’s
health. There is also a need to establish the extent of the influence of provincial income on school
building conditions in the case of the Philippines. It will be interesting to find out whether the alarming
need for public school facilities across the country will be solved in due time by the recent increase in
the government’s education budget. However, we acknowledge that an increase in funding does not
always solve the problem because non-financial factors may also affect the allocation of education
resources as the ability to utilize assets is crucial to solve differences in decentralized education systems.
The results of this study show that school building quality in the Philippines is affected by geography,
climate and societal conditions. School buildings in the country’s eastern coastline are poor, compared
to the buildings in relatively safe areas example is the Northern provinces which are protected by a
mountain range. Decades of civil unrest have also resulted in depreciated education facilities in southern
provinces. As we found, geographic and social factors beyond the control of the local school boards
affected the physical condition of the school buildings, therefore the national government has to
address these issues in order to minimize the disparities and provide equal access to education. The
proposed reallocation of education resources that is relative to the current state of a province is shown
to mitigate the situation by eliminating disparities caused by the natural and social environment but not
the ones caused by overpopulation. Teacher education sums up clearly that trainings and shaping up
every teachers here in the Philippines is a priority for the welfare of their beloved students and a even
the higher education here in the Philippines passed a policy and standard for also the welfare and
professionalism of a teacher. Lastly reforming a curriculum is not easy especially here in the Philippines
where the students who experience now the new curriculum feel the struggle of the new curriculum but
some of us know how this curriculum will be a better trainer in our education and even in our lives.
 FOREIGN STUDIES

Thesis in Teacher Education- research orientation and professional relevance

Council for the renewal of higher education

Cardona (2009) notes that concentration on initial teacher education "would seem to provide
the best means to create a new generation of teachers who will ensure the successful implementation
of inclusive policies and practices" More specifically regarding teacher education, Ballard (2003) says
that inclusive education is concerned with issues of social justice, which means that graduates entering
the teaching profession should "understand how they might create classrooms and schools that address
issues of respect, fairness and equity. As part of this exertion, they will need to understand the
historical, socio-cultural and ideological contexts that create discriminatory and despotic practices in
education. The isolation and rejection of disabled students is but one area of injustice. Others include
gender discrimination, poverty and racism."

Many teacher education programs concentrate on bringing theoretical views to bear on events
of teacher practice. There is a concern for encouragement critical analysis. One aim of this development
project is to integrate research orientation and professional bearing as concerns university studies in
teacher education, thesis and future work. The idea is to make students gain deeper insight into
academic culture and research as well as into school culture. This concerns differences as well as
similarities within these practices. Another aim is to develop models for group-supervision.

The students will have two supervisors:

 Traditional supervisor will support the student as concerns scientific and mathematical issues.
 Process supervisor will support the research process and guide the students into appropriating
ways of thinking, reading, writing, discussing and documenting their work.

This development project is at an initial stage where students' and supervisors' ideas about scientific
work and professional relevance of the thesis will be investigated. Students in teacher education will be
involved in all stages of the project, as for instance planning, definition of quality criteria of the thesis,
evaluation of models for supervision.

Rationale for change

Teacher education in Sweden has long been carried out at teachers’ training secondary and
tertiary level students with their close connections with schools. Accordingly, it has traditionally not
been research- and theory-based, but rather based on well-tried practices. Earlier, and partly as a result
of Anglo-Saxon influence in the domain of education, critical inquiry and reflection have been less
prominent elements than teaching and learning methods, norms and values. Teacher students are not
used to posing research questions. Nor has it been self-evident in teacher education to carry out and
supervise extensive written work and to see writing as an instrument for critical examination and
competence development. In Swedish teacher education, a thesis was introduced as a compulsory
element in 1993 (SFS 1993:100). This was done to facilitate an integration of teacher education into
university traditions of teaching and learning, which is supposed to be research- and theory-based.
Besides, the thesis should be relevant to teachers’ practice. An official committee report [To learn and
to lead] (SOU 1999:63) emphasizes more strongly than ever a research-oriented teacher education. In
line with this idea, a reformed education for teachers was launched in 2001. Several commissions had
pointed at the fact that teacher students must be involved in more theoretical work in their training. The
students should be trained in argumentation, analytic thinking and writing. To achieve these skills, the
students should be active in self-tuition, be able to participate in seminars and experience new forms of
examination. A strong argument for a reformed teacher education is that the character of teachers’
work changes and that it will continuously do so. According to the government bill (Prop
1999/2000:135), teachers must engage in lifelong learning to be able to catch up with changing
professional tasks. In line with this, teacher education must offer opportunities to participate in scientific
discourse. Seminars and group supervision are sessions where independent thinking and ability to pose
and frame research questions can be supported. Lauvås & Handal (1993), Forslund (1995) and Hård af
Segerstad & Silén (1999) give thorough advice as concerns development of professional competence
and supervision of learning processes. Andersson & Persson (2002) describe a project with the aim to
offer students supervision of their individual projects as well as a network for social support in groups.

Strategies for Managing Educational Facilities Infrastructure

Each year OECD countries devote, on average, more than 5% of their gross national product to
education. Recent work of the OECD Programme on Educational Building (PEB) suggests that the cost of
building, running, cleaning, heating and maintaining schools approaches one fifth of that amount.
“Improving the Quality of Educational Building”, the conviction is strengthening and this is backed by
experience and research indicating that the quality of facilities has an impact not only on educational
outcomes but on the well-being of students and teachers. There is a growing awareness of the role that
educational facilities play in shaping attitudes toward the environment and the contribution they make
to urban renewal. (Earthman 1998) stated that relationship between student achievement and
behaviour and the condition of the built environment are necessary. Some of the most important
factors that influence learning and living are those that relate to control of the thermal environment,
proper illumination, adequate space and furnishings. If, as studies and experience strongly indicate,
achievement (i.e. student test scores) is greater in above-standard schools than in substandard
buildings, it is the obligation of the responsible authorities to improve the facilities. If it is not the pupils’
fault that they are not the most successful, who is to blame? The quality and duration of a building are
affected by how it is looked after, the ways in which servicing and repairs are carried out, and the rate at
which needs and requirements change. Therefore it is necessary to develop strategies for managing
educational facilities but also to do research to better understand how facilities influence student
behaviour and achievement. As the French Institute for Research on the Economics of Education
expressed it: For a long time, the quality of education was measured in terms of the quality of its inputs
(e.g. more resources, better trained teachers, smaller classes, better teaching aids) generating a
corresponding improvement in the cognitive performance of the learners. Without challenging 2 any of
these ideas, modern research is endeavoring to grasp the laws that link inputs and outputs.

What are the main problems experienced?

- An inability to present sufficiently convincing justification for (increasing) funds.

- A marked deterioration in the condition of facilities and in the morale of facility-users.

- The use of existing facilities to provide adequate, up-to-date educational and social services.

Authorities must decide whether to integrate requirements within an existing system or to

invest in a new system.

Action plan:

1. Establish a condition survey (strategic and optional).

2. Appoint realistic costs to needs.

3. Establish standards.

4. Convince authorities (key people).

5. Ensure financing; arrange “funding routes”.

6. Ensure adequate management in regard to documentation, planning, implementation and evaluation.

7. Review performance.

Relationship between science and mathematics classroom facilities conditions and ninth grade
students’ attitudes toward science and mathematics

Cash found significant difference in academic scores with students in poor buildings and those in
buildings in good condition. Science classrooms and mathematics laboratory and achievement were
examined and were determined to affect science and mathematical performance. Earthman, Cash, and
Van Berkum (1996) completed a similar study to Cash’s (1993) study, with similar results. This study was
conducted in North Dakota and the CAPE was renamed State Assessment of Facilities in Education
(SAFE)., Earthman and Lemasters (2011) had both contributed to the literature on educational facilities.
Lemasters (1997), when originally working with the model created by Cash (1993), completed a
systematic synthesis of studies pertaining to color, maintenance, age, classroom structure, climate
control, density, noise, and lighting in education facilities. Lemasters (1997) examined how different
studies showed evidence for relationships between building elements and student achievement and
student behavior. Lemasters found that students in satisfactory or better buildings were more
academically successful than students in unsatisfactory buildings. Earthman (2006) developed My
Classroom Appraisal Protocol © (MCAP) to measure teachers’ perceived attitudes about their working
conditions and when used, provided evidence that a relationship existed between the physical work
environment of teachers and their attitudes (Earthman & Lemasters, 2009). Earthman (2007) also
established an instrument to measure the 29 students’ attitudes about the educational facilities,
Students School Building Attitude Scale©. A study by Leigh (2012) used both the MCAP and the CAPE
instrument for a study that found elementary teachers’ attitudes correlated with the condition of the
building they occupied. Bailey (2009) conducting a study similar to Lemasters (1997) also found a
relationship between building conditions and the effects on students and teachers. Bishop (2009)
conducted a qualitative study that found teachers reacted positively to the effects of a new school
building and believed that their students also reacted with positive improvements. Statistically
significant relationships have been found between specific design elements of the school building and
student outcomes (Baker & Bernstein, 2012; Tanner, 2008). Movement and circulation patterns of the
design affected students’ success in English, math, and science (Tanner, 2008).

History of Curriculum Reform and Student Achievement

Education in America has seen many face lifts, and each decade has provided a unique
perspective on the priorities of public education. In the middle of the century, American schools were
falling behind other nations in the areas of reading and mathematics. Since the late 1970s, public
education has undergone a series of reforms to increase both the levels and range of math and science
content that students master through the curriculum. And in the years that followed, data showed that
more students were taking more difficult courses (Office of Educational Research and Improvement,
1994). The push to increase the rigor of U.S. math and science classes in the 1970s led to the next
reform introduced by former president George Herbert Walker Bush. President Bush was growing
impatient with school reform, and in the 1980s he commented on how school reform at the state level
was much too slow and too timid. He placed great pressure on the country’s schools to raise the
standards and improve our educational system. This educational reform movement is often said to have
been launched by a flood of reports and studies that besieged the nation in 1983 and 1984 (Jennings,
1998). These studies drove home the point that the overall quality of the nation’s schools was, at best, a
disgrace and, at worse, a threat to the U.S. economic and political welfare (Hawley et al., 1988). In
response, by the end of the 1980s, 42 states had raised their high school graduation requirements,
according to Coley’s (1994) Educational Testing Service report on educational reform. Over that decade,
there was a gradual increase in students completing the minimum academic program, which consisted
of 4 years of English and 3 years of high school level math, science, and social studies. As this federal
reform was enacted to raise the level and expectation of courses students were successfully completing.
American students were still not completing courses with the academic rigor that would rival other
nations like the Soviet Union. Moreover, as policymakers began to track and compare the academic
achievement of U.S. students with those of other developed nations, American achievement levels
began to fall behind (Viadero, 2007). The president's quest for an improved educational system may
have been leading slowly to an increase in the number of science and math courses students were
completing, but not necessarily to better schools. 32 At the state level, this decade saw a push for
students to take more academic classes in an effort to increase student achievement (Jennings, 1998). In
addition, states expanded testing to better track student achievement and determine preparedness of
students for more rigorous academic work. States also began to lengthen the school days and the school
year to boost student achievement, according to the Consortium for Policy Research in Education
(Fuhrman & Kirst, 1994). President Bush still felt too little progress was being made. The president, at
this point, determined it was time for a national approach to increase graduation requirements.
 The president anticipated that the leaders of each state would resist this plan if it was driven
from federal level, but that did not occur. Historically, governors did not want to lose local control, and
federal control was often met with great resistance. The governors in their own states had tried to
create change in the 1980s through enactment of many laws mandating more stringent high school
graduation requirements and raising requirements for teacher qualification, and yet they had not
attained the improvements desired (Jennings, 1998). To the president’s surprise, the governors were
looking for direction and top-down support to help improve education, and they embraced this national
reform. As with any presidential change, a driving force is the improvement of education across the
country. President Bill Clinton took office in 1993 and he also had a plan to improve our nation's schools.
The title of this plan was simply “Goals 2000” and it was sent to Congress as a reform to improve schools
and student performance. Goals 2000 offered aid for bottom-up state and local school reform and
increased accountability for results, while reducing red tape. In the previous administration, increasing
the number of core courses students completed was the focus. The new administration took the 33
approach that the curriculum needs to be based on a common set of standards. The new reform focus
was to motivate students to achieve higher common standards (Jennings, 1998). There remains an
argument that states should be left alone in determining their education policy and not be subject to
educational reforms imposed by a national administration. The U.S. Constitution embodies the idea that
government should be limited in its powers, and that the closer the government is to the people, the
better it will function. In education, this has meant that, although states have the authority over the
schools, the power to determine the content of education has usually been delegated to local school
boards. With over 14,000 school districts and 97,000 public institutions in America (United States
Department of Education, 2007), historically, there has been a great variation in the education being
offered to students. Starting with expanded course requirements under the first President Bush, and
continuing with federal pressure for states to adopt common curriculum standards under President
Clinton, the federal government began a series of steadily progressive steps to intervene in the
education provided to students at a state and local level with an eye to greater reliability in producing
internationally competitive educational attainment levels for America’s students.

Student Involvement in Curriculum Reform

There is astoundingly very little research on the involvement of students in curriculum reform.
We do know that young people have unique perspectives on learning, teaching, and schooling, and that
their insights not only require our attention, but also the responses of the adults making the decisions
(Cook-Sather, 2006). Students and teachers have 45 different perspectives on learning, and
policymakers need to appreciate those differences and respond (Thiessen, 2006). When policymakers do
think of students, they think of them as potential beneficiaries of change. The view that students can be
involved in the process is seldom embraced. Policymakers are looking at achievement results, skills
students would attain, attitudes that they would adopt, and the impact on potential jobs for students
(Fullan & Stiegelbauer, 1991). They hardly think of students as participants in the change process. When
school reform directly impacts the classroom environment, information is hardly ever provided to
students. Involving students in the change process is domineering, and communicating with them about
the impact of school reform is also vital. No matter how elaborate and complete a plan may be, it cannot
be carried out successfully unless the students are brought rather fully into the knowledge of what to do
and how to do it, and brought to a commitment to cooperation in the process but communication of
plans to students is almost never addressed. (Clark & Yinger, 1980, pp. 21-22) The outcomes of school
reform are measured by the success of students in the classroom. While little is done to involve
students, they hold the measurement stick to the successes or failures of educational reform. It is worth
mentioning that any innovation that requires new activities on the part of the students will succeed or
fail based on whether students actually participate in embracing these activities (Fullan & Stiegelbauer,
1991). We need to stop thinking of students in terms of just learning outcomes and start thinking of
them as people who should be asked to be involved in this process. Involving students 46 in specific
change, into new forms of updated learning, directly addresses the knowledge, skills, and behaviors
necessary for all students to become betrothed in their own learning.

SYNTHESIS

Helping students understand better in the classroom, school or in the university are one of the
primary concerns of every teacher. Teacher Education is the foundation of every student that actively
engaged in any education processes, teachers and students work together in the teaching-learning
process for having a picture-perfect perspective for the better future of the students without teacher
education professionalism of every teachers in all country won’t be cultivate for the welfare of every
students and even in themselves. In consideration of how the teacher educations naturally cope up
education we need to study also how a facility building affects us as a student. School officials who
maintain the environment of educational facilities building have a significant impact upon teaching and
learning. Perhaps, an essential component of effective schools is that they are as eager to avoid things
that don’t work as they are committed to implementing things that do. In effect, because research has
shown certain aspects of school climate to be determinant of academic achievement, it is obligatory
upon district and school administrators to make improvements in the physical climate of urban schools
so as to establish gains in academic achievement on behalf of poor and minority students. Lastly the
curriculum reform objective is to stretch those individualistic knowledge of every students in higher
form so that they are ready for every challenging obstacles in their lives also as we all know that every
students have hidden intelligence that they cannot express because of absences of developing in their
personality hence in this curriculum reform those students that needed to develop their knowledge and
also their personality will be feel convenient and they can participate in their discerning group of talents
and in academic groups.
REFERENCES
FACILITY BUILDING

Hinum, M. (1999) Strategies for Managing Educational Facilities Infrastructure BMUK (Federal Ministry
of Education and Cultural Affairs), Austria
http://www.oecd.org/edu/innovation-education/2675945.pdf

Ford, Angela Y. (2016) Relationship between science and mathematics classroom facilities conditions
and ninth grade students’ attitudes toward science and mathematics, “a Dissertation Presented in
Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Education” (Liberty University)
http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2272&context=doctoral

TEACHER EDUCATION

Ahlstrand, E. & Bergqvist, K. (n.d) Thesis in teacher education – research orientation and professional
relevance (Department of Behavioural Sciences, Linköping University). Retrieved from
https://gupea.ub.gu.se/bitstream/2077/18147/1/gupea_2077_18147_1.pdf

CURRICULUM BUILD-UP

VanderJagt, Douglas D. (2013) "Student Thoughts and Perceptions on Curriculum Reform.” Dissertations.
Paper 154.
http://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1156&context=dissertations