In 2011, the Department of Education had made the historic implementation of shifting from the

10-year basic education curriculum to the Kinder to 12 Program (K-12) in phases. The added two-year
Senior High Track aims to equip students with knowledge and skills that will help them prepare better for
their chosen path – in college, employment, or entrepreneurship. Senior High School (SHS) is the last two
years of the K to 12 program that includes Grades 11 and 12 (Edukasyon.ph, n.d.) One of the tracks is the
academic track. This track will help the student to prepare him or herself for the subject specialization of
their college course he/she will take in the future. There are four strands in this track, the General
Academic Track, Humanities and Social Science, Accountancy and Business Management, and Science,
Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. According to Edukasyon.ph, Science, Technology,
Engineering, and Mathematics are intertwining disciplines when applied in the real world. The difference
of the STEM curriculum with the other strands and tracks is the focus on advanced concepts and topics.
Based on the 2016 report of DepEd, there are 228,621 students enrolled in this track throughout the
country.

With this pertinent information, this paper will focus on the preparedness of the country in
implementing the STEM track under the K-12 education system.

According to Business World (2019), on a senate committee hearing, Senator Gatchalian raised
the need to review the implementation of the K to 12 curricula in the count ry. This review is a measure to
improve the basic education system after declining test results. According to him, the quality of basic
education remains low despite Republic Act No. 10533 or the Enhanced Basic Education Act of 2013,
judging from the recent National Achievement Test (NAT) average scores of Grade 6 and 10 students
(Philippines News Agency, 2020). It is important to note this reality for the core objective of the recent
education system in the country aims to develop graduates with 21 st century skills.

Numerous factors can be attributed to the current predicament faced by the country in the
implementation of the K-12 program. First is the shortage of science and math teachers in the country. In
2016, DepEd secretary Leonor Briones stressed the need to hire more teachers with the implementation of
the K to 12 program, which created 36,641 free teaching posts. The government tried to make ends meet
for this shortage by having DepEd offer teaching posts with above entry-level salary grades. DepEd also
called for graduates of Science, Math, or Engineering courses without LET certification, as well TESDA
accredited technical-vocational graduates with expertise in specific learning areas, to apply as part-time
teachers for the K to 12 Senior High School Program (UNTV News and Rescue, 2017). However, despite
of these measures, the government is still dealing with this problem. This reality has prompted DepEd to
shifted from relying on academically-trained teachers to teachers with different skills in order to address
this problem. The government must bear in mind that the teachers are very critical in the delivery of
quality education.

According to De Guzman, R. (2019), the Department of Education (DepEd) admitted that more
classrooms and facilities are needed to be constructed to accommodate the ever-growing population of
Filipino students. This shortage of classrooms for DepEd schools is also an issue. With the
implementation of the K-12 program, Benjie Valbuena, national chair of the Alliance of Concerned
Teachers-Philippines (ACT-Philippines) estimated the classroom shortage in the country to be 113,995 as
of 2017. Sec. Briones said the agency had started implementing a “last mile program,” and was taking an
inventory of schools around the country that needed to catch up (Cruz, 2019). However, this has been a
recurring problem of the government. This lead to dividing the classes into three four-hour shifts or half-
day classes that shortened lecture and other academic-related sessions. Also, makeshifts classrooms are
not conducive to learning as it affects the student’s retention and focus.

Aside from the obvious lack of classrooms, there is also a lack of science laboratories to facilitate
science learning and application of its concepts to students. In 2014, DepEd reported a shortage of science
laboratories in regions III, IV-A, X, XI, and XII, with an average of only one in ten schools having its
own laboratory (Calimag, 2017). Another consideration that we need to address before the
implementation of the K-12 Program is the lack of school equipment and facilities. There are about 23
million students entering the public schools every opening of the school year, but the DepEd (Department
of Education), even up to now, is aware of the limitations that the system has in terms of number of
classrooms, buildings, chairs, rest rooms, LCDs, computers, internet connection, and others. It should be
noted that the school facilities are the support system of our teachers in their teaching learning encounters.
The K-12 Program is now on its more 9th year, but we have not yet addressed the basic or essential needs
and demands of the public schools.

DepEd also faces a challenge in terms of the quality of its textbooks. There are shortage of
learning and teaching materials and manuals, which are very much needed in teaching. We have to
remember that textbooks are the main references, but there should be ample and relevant available
references that senior high students could use for their studies. Students must not be so exposed with
foreign ideas and cultures through the social media.

Education is big social investment for families or parents as well as the entire nation. We cannot
afford not to have a good or quality education, even at least the basic level. Although the true aim of
education is to nurture human being to become truly human being; however, because of global
competition, we need to educate and train our students to be at par with their counterparts in other parts of
the world and, of course, we need them to be parts or contributors to develop our national economy.
Cognizant to global opportunities that we could gain if we have good quality education, let us not forget
that our education is essential on catering to the needs and demands of the local community. With this,
there is a need for us, the government, key stakeholders and the members of the community to work hand
in hand by assessing the problems or challenges that we face in implementing this education system in
order to identify the right interventions to address it.
 References

Business World. (2019, March 6). K to 12 review finds declining test scores, skills mismatch.
https://www.bworldonline.com/k-to-12-review-finds-declining-test-scores-skills-mismatch/
Calimag, M. (2017, April 2) UP teams develops low cost science lab for public high schools.
NewsBytes.ph.
http://newsbytes.ph/2017/04/02/up-team-develops-low-cost-science-lab-for-public-highschools/
Cruz, M. (2019, June 4). School opening woes: Many students, few classrooms. Inquirer.Net.
https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1126414/school-opening-woes-many-students-
fewclassrooms#ixzz6dIQ91TLu
De Guzman, R. (2019, June 3). DepEd more classroom needed amid growing number of students. UNTV
News and Rescue. https://www.untvweb.com/news/deped-more-classrooms-needed-amid-
growing-number-of-students/
Edukasyon.ph. (n.d.). What is Senior high school. https://www.edukasyon.ph/courses/senior-high-tracks
Philippines News Agency. (2020, September 30). Gatchalian seeks people on declining quality of teacher
education. https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1117072
UNTV News. (2017, August 16). DepEd to address shortage of teachers and lack of classrooms. UNTV
News and Rescue. https://www.untvweb.com/news/deped-address-shortage-teachers-lack-
classrooms/