I would like to ask for some feedback regarding this idea of mine for the Philippines (Paumanhin po sa lahat; alam ko dapat sa Filipino ko ipapaliwanag ‘to, pero gusto ko rin sana na maintindihan din ito ng mga kasali dito na hindi lumaki sa Pinas, o yung mga lumaki na sa Ingles o sa ibang wika, o yung hindi Pilipino [“foreigner”, kung meron man].).

The goal we want for the Philippines that we’re all probably aiming for is: A HIGH STANDARD OF LIVING (like what First World countries and Newly-Developed countries have).

But to get to that, we have to have: COMPETITIVE EXPORT-RELATED BUSINESSES (not only agricultural, commercial and service-oriented industries, but technological and manufacturing-related industries especially; plus everything else associated with it: scientific research, a stable financial sector, the necessary infrastructure, etc.; I mean, which major First World or Newly-Developed countries don’t have these [of course, to the exclusion of really small countries like Singapore or Luxembourg]? And we would need to have much of these; with profits in proportion to the country’s growing population; too less profits or too big a population won’t do much to improve the country’s standard of living).

But to get to that, we have to have: A WELL-EDUCATED AND HIGHLY-SKILLED WORKFORCE (the Philippines has one of the highest literacy rates in Asia, but I don’t mean having just the ability to read and write [it doesn’t even matter whether in English, Filipino, Chinese or what-have-you]; what I mean is possessing the necessary knowledge required for a specific job, and if possible, to a high degree; ever wondered why we have to export raw materials like logs and minerals to First World countries, and then import them back as finished products or machinery? ‘cause we don’t have the necessary know-how to do the job and export such finished products ourselves.).

But to get to that, we have to have: HIGH-QUALITY EDUCATION Now here’s where the problems come in. How can our people, or future generations of Filipinos, have high-quality education when: MOST OF THE BRIGHTEST AND MOST HARDWORKING FILIPINOS HAVE ALREADY LEFT THE COUNTRY (with many more from younger generations planning to live and work elsewhere). THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION IS ONE OF THE MOST CORRUPT SERVICES OF THE GOVERNMENT (lots of money from the national budget goes to this government department alone; looking alone at the plight of poor Filipino children everywhere in the country [especially those who are forced to work at a very young age and can’t go to school to study], you’ll probably get an idea as to where all that money goes). THE PHILIPPINE GOVERNMENT (WHICH RUNS THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION) IS RUN BY A MAJORITY OF INCOMPETENT LAWMAKERS (well, almost everybody is represented in Congress; we’ve got lawyers, businessmen, landowners, sons and daughters of former politicians, TV and movie celebrities, former rebel leaders, so on and so forth. It’s not our lawmakers’ backgrounds that bother me really, it’s what they’re doing with public funds or taxpayers’ money [or should I say “our money”], which in my opinion is either misspent, stolen, or both. And that’s just on the national level; of course, incompetence exists in local levels of government, as well.).

Now here’s the idea I’m proposing: How about we make the final year of our high schools or the final year of our usual 4 or 5-year college/university courses into an academic instructor’s internship year? I’m sure many high school and college seniors would say no to that, but it’s either that, or we add an extra year to both the high school and the usual 4 and 5-year courses we have in college/university (which I’m sure the Department of Education will say no to, for “financial constraint” reasons).

But I would like our 4th-year high school and 4th/5th-year college students out there (as well as our institutions of education