IN EVERY mentoring the mentors? session the Foundation for Worldwide People Power has ever held, the first question we ask our participants is ?Why are you a teacher??

Almost all of the teachers that have joined our seminars are from public schools. Some have been teaching for less than five years; others for more than 25.

Some said that their profession was chosen for them by their parents who felt they had the least potential to succeed. Others said that they enrolled in BS Ed because they wanted to work abroad ? preferably as teachers ? but they could take on other jobs if need be. All of them said that they persevered despite the difficulties because teaching was more than just a job for them.

None of them said that they responded to this calling because of the pay.

The United Nations? ?Education For All Global Monitoring Report of 2005? says that ?debates continue to rage about the appropriate levels of teacher salary costs, which represent by far the greatest expenditure, especially in developing countries, often leaving a fraction (barely 1 percent in several cases) for textbooks and other teaching materials. The need to save resources for other inputs has to be balanced against the need to pay teachers well enough to attract and retain qualified individuals.?

This is especially true here in the Philippines. Our Constitution provides that the largest chunk of the national budget be allocated for education. However, the Department of Education is the country?s biggest bureaucracy, employing around 500,000 teachers not to mention the non-teaching personnel.

By conservative estimates, around 80-85 percent of the budgetary allocation is spent on salaries and wages. That doesn?t leave much for essential items like instructional materials and school facilities. A former DepEd undersecretary once told me that by his own reckoning, the DepEd could only spend about P350 per student per year with what was left.

The UN report goes on to say that ?countries that have achieved high learning standards have invested steadily in the teaching profession. But in many countries, teachers? salaries relative to those of other professions have declined over the past two decades and are often too low to provide a reasonable standard of living.?

This sentiment resonated strongly at the forum on ?The Teacher?s Plight To Survive,? held a few days ago at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines? Bulwagang Balagtas.

The event was organized by the Philippine Public School Teachers Association, the country?s biggest professional association of teachers, and the Department of Education.

Every major association of teachers and non-teaching personnel was represented at that forum ? from the Association of DepEd Directors, to superintendents? and supervisors? groups on to the Department of Education National Employees Union.

In their manifesto, our public school educators said that ?we [who] comprise almost half of all government workers remain to be one of the lowest paid and most overworked in the country today. Our salaries are lower than our counterparts in the military and police, many of whom do not possess the college degree, qualifications and eligibilities required of us.?

The teachers? groups added that ?it was a sad commentary of our times that our low compensation and low morale have forced us to work even as domestic helpers in other countries, which can provide us with higher salaries and benefits to feed our families and to keep up with the rising cost of living.?

The teachers? manifesto contained an urgent appeal to the House of Representatives to enact House Bill 5213, which would effectively add P9,000 to the existing monthly salaries of both teachers and non-teaching personnel. HB 5213, sponsored by Representative Del de Guzman and supported by Representative Teofisto Guingona III, likewise provides that the added compensation would be spread out over three years.

House Joint Resolution 24, filed by Speaker Prospero Nograles Jr., seems to have the numbers, however. HJR 24 seeks to amend the Salary Standardization Law. Under HJR 24, teachers will still get a pay raise, but substantially less than that provided by HB 5213 and spread out over a longer period.

Jonathan Malaya, DepEd assistant secretary and legislative liaison, said that, so far, only 40 congressmen out of 220 have expressed support for HB 5213.

I recall some years ago, a number of good private school teachers started moving to public schools because the starting salary was higher. Their friends wished the teachers all the best at their new jobs and harbored high hopes that they would somehow have a positive effect on the teaching quality in the public schools. However, faced with unusually large class sizes, a lack of everything needed to teach well and a resolve-sapping bureaucratic mind-set, the good teachers succumbed to ?a culture of mediocrity.?

Do our teachers deserve HB 5213?s better pay? Of course.

Would a substantial pay raise directly translate to improved learning outcomes?

Not likely, unless that wage benefit is part of a well-considered movement for genuine education reform, anchored on learning and powered by the collective will of all education stakeholders. This movement happens in May. If you care about our country?s future, you are welcome to join.