Teachers’ group challenges VP Sara Duterte to fulfill former President’s promise to teachers

The Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) Philippines has urged Vice President Sara Duterte to deliver on her father’s, the former President Rodrigo Duterte, unfulfilled promise to teachers.

As incoming DepEd Chief, the ACT asked VP Duterte to prioritize the welfare of teachers.

She should push for significantly increasing teacher’s salaries to correct the distortion in the government salary scheme where teacher’s pay lag behind those of uniformed personnel and nurses…This will relieve teachers of burdensome loans, improve their living conditions, lift their morale, and ultimately improve the quality of teaching and education,

ACT Philippines Spokesperson Vladimir Quetua said.

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Furthermore, Quetua advised Duterte to meet the government’s unpaid obligations to teachers such as the overtime pay for 77 excess workdays which they have rendered for the school year (SY) 2020-2021 and oblige Commission on Elections (Comelec) to immediately pay the additional honorarium of poll workers who rendered extended election service in the May 2022 elections.

Quetua also said VP Duterte can support the demands of teachers as well as other sectors to suspend the PhilHealth premium increase.

According to Quetua, another challenge that VP Duterte should prioritize as DepEd secretary is the need to resolve the current learning crisis affected by the pandemic.

He said that she could rectify this by diligently working to meet the requirements for safe school reopening and rolling out an evidence-based education recovery program.

She should also objectively evaluate the current education situation through nationwide student assessments and consultations with education stakeholders… These can effectively guide measures for addressing the learning crisis that plagues our education system,

Quetua added.

ACT hopes that Duterte will be face these challenges and truly help teachers and the whole education in the country.