RECOGNIZING the urgent need for better teacher training, the Philippine Business for Education (PBEd) emphasized that skilled educators are essential for enhancing student learning outcomes.
PBEd Executive Director Justine B. Raagas said in a statement on Thursday that teachers must continuously be upskilled and reskilled to ensure that the education system remains responsive to changing needs.
“Our teachers are the most important investment for a more adaptive education system,” she added.
Citing a recent report by the Second Congressional Commission on Education, PBEd said there is a troubling misalignment between teacher training programs and the actual demands of schools.
Despite the popularity of education degrees, studies indicate that 62% of high school teachers are teaching subjects outside their college majors, particularly in the sciences, it added.
To address these challenges, PBEd urges the prioritization of new proposals from the Teacher Education Council (TEC) aimed at modernizing preservice teacher education.
These reforms focus on expanding experiential learning opportunities from the first year of college, emphasizing subject specialization to reduce teacher-subject mismatches, and strengthening early childhood education training for kindergarten to grade 3 educators.
PBEd further called for enhanced data collection efforts to better understand teachers’ actual needs and recommended improvements to the licensing process to ensure that future educators are well informed and better prepared for their roles. — Chloe Mari A. Hufana