Those who teach

Imagine the staggering responsibility of teachers. Imagine the commitment they make, the hardship they endure, in guiding the hope of the motherland. They’re not paid halfway enough (among other things). To think that Filipinos universally consider a good education a crucial part of a child’s future.

“There’s a teacher everywhere. Whether in times of war, times of peace, times of prosperity, in places of joy, there is always a teacher, and we will recognize each and every one of them,” Education Secretary Leonor Briones said last week at a ceremony marking National Teachers Month (Sept. 5-Oct. 5). The occasion was the Metrobank Foundation’s recognition of the country’s most outstanding teachers.

The Metrobank search process and awarding rites make up a yearly, noteworthy, undertaking. But there are 683,000 public school teachers in the Philippines, according to Briones. “The challenge is, perhaps, to widen the net of recognizing,” she said. “For every 10 teachers we are recognizing now, there are a thousand more who are unrecognized, whom we do not know, are in the most remote places, who suffer along the way, and yet choose to continue their job.”

Indeed. The stories of this year’s Metrobank awardees are inspiring, but there are other teachers out there, particularly in the rural areas, who toil to guide young minds in the most primitive classrooms, with the barest educational materials and resources. They work in heart-wrenching conditions, for a pittance, galvanized only by passion for their profession and compassion for their wards. (And those wards, young as they are, often have to overcome their own obstacles and literally cross rivers to get to school.)

Among this year’s extraordinary awardees is Roy Basa, who leads the Ballpen at Iba Pa Foundation at Negros Occidental High School in Bacolod City, where the foundation raises funds to send 40 adult students to night class. Basa has devoted himself to teaching construction workers and household help from 4:30 to 8:30 p.m. “In here, it’s not just theory, all minds. Here, you first have to gain their trust, catch their heart, and then real learning will follow through,” he said.

There is Mark Anthony Torres who teaches at Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Technology, but is also officer in charge of the Institute for Peace and Development in Mindanao, which helps teachers start their own Peace Education Centers. “By profession, I am a biologist,” he said, “but I work for peace.”

The other awardees are Winona Diola of Muntinlupa City, Rujealyn Cancino of Lingayen, Pangasinan, Josephine Chonie Obseñares of Butuan City, Agusan del Norte, and Arnol Rosales of Naujan, Oriental Mindoro—all for the elementary level; Nelson Agoyaoy of Caloocan City, Ma. Regaele Olarte of Muntinlupa and Katherine Faith Bustos of Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya—all for the secondary level; and Ernelea Cao of the University of the Philippines Diliman—for the tertiary level.

The government has seen fit to throw money at the education sector: In the 2016 national budget, it got the biggest chunk—P435.9 billion out of the P3.002-trillion appropriation; for 2017, P567.5 billion out of the P3.35 trillion.

Briones is expanding the Alternative Learning System and putting up schools for indigenous peoples—firm steps toward the inclusion of those unable to take formal schooling for any reason or belong to the marginalized cultural communities. But these steps also require more and better teachers, and more and better measures to promote their wellbeing as frontliners in the continuing effort to lift the country out of poverty through education.

Here’s the bottom line: We need to make things better for teachers beyond National Teachers Month. Candidate Rodrigo Duterte promised, if he won the presidency, to increase teachers’ wages. Now President, he reiterated the promise last July. He must be held to it.

We sing paeans to teachers yearly, wax nostalgic for school days under their stern but warm gaze, and heap praise on their persons. But the appreciation barely scratches the surface of society’s general indifference. Imagine their plight—and the country’s loss—when some of the best of them are driven by economic exigencies to abandon the classroom, as well as their calling, to toil in hostile lands overseas.