The youth party-list group Kabataan condemned the Aquino administration’s “sneaky” signing of Republic Act 10533 or the Enhanced Basic Education Act of 2013, which will institutionalize the K+12 program, two days after a rocky and controversy-ridden midterm elections.

“Aquino has no shame. It is clear that he waited until after the voting to sign the K+12 law since it was certain that he could not bear the political backlash brought about by the massive opposition to the program during the campaign period,” said Terry Ridon, lawyer and president of Kabataan.

The newly-signed law seeks to restructure the Philippine basic education system. The law will now require Filipino students to undergo Kindergarten, six years in elementary, four years in junior high school and two years in senior high school.

According to Kabataan, since the inception of the proposal for the program, students, parents, teachers among others have been vehemently opposing the policy. They opposed the K+12 program because it adds to the financial burden of already impoverished Filipino families, and merely cultivates the youth for cheap labor abroad.

Ridon said that the signing into law of RA 10533 shows how adamant Aquino is on pushing legislation that further curtails and degrades the education system in favor of profit and privatization.

Kabataan likewise questioned the preparations of the Palace to implement the law as the upcoming school year is about a month away.

“During the initial implementation of the K+12, schools, teachers and parents were made to rush into new teaching modules which were untested and due to the time, ineffective. Many youths were forced into home-school because of school shortages that have not even been addressed. Aquino is too concerned with his flagship program even at the expense of the youth’s future” added Ridon.

According to the economic think-tank Ibon Foundation, from last year’s 125, 569 classroom shortages, 9, 332 of these will be built in cooperation with private companies and the Public-Private Partnership program causing further privatization of education.

Kabataan said that the two additional years of K+12 is “two more years of torture for the youth.” It is estimated that Filipino families will shoulder an estimated average of P12,000 per year because of the said program.

“The K+12, unlike what Aquino is promising, is not a solution to education and employment woes. Instead, it will further worsen and deepen the problems,” said Vencer Crisostomo, national chairperson of Anakbayan.

College Editors Guild of the Philippines (CEGP), meanwhile, said that teachers are also in need of training, security of tenure and higher salaries. This restructuring of the education system also shows that the government is blind to the objective conditions to the Filipino people who suffer from low salaries, high cost of needs, demolitions among others.

“Government spending for education, as it is, is not enough to meet the shortages at present. The shortages will worsen and we will be faced will greater problems,” Crisostomo said.

He added that tuition rates for tertiary education will further increase as the government’s K+12 will also mean abandonment for tertiary education.

“We will see more budget cuts for SUCs and commercialization of universities. The government is set to further abandon tertiary education,” Crisostomo concluded.

For cheap labor

Youth groups also believe that the greater problem is the program’s “problematic and flawed neoliberal framework” for employment.

The K+12 program aims its students to graduate as semi-skilled workers to work abroad, an indicator that the Aquino government cannot provide enough jobs for Filipinos in the Philippines and pushing Filipinos to work overseas. K+12 program also serves the need foreign countries, such as the US, for cheap labor from the third world and exploiting our laborers abroad, according to CEGP.

“The K+12 aims to create cheaper, more ‘exploitable’ labor. The program is to make sure more ‘semi-skilled’ youths enter the labor force as early as 18 years old, which will make the unemployment problem worse. The net effect will be lower wages for workers,” Crisostomo said.

Various youth groups are organizing protest actions this enrollment against Aquino’s K+12 program.

“There is wide opposition against K+12, especially as it obviously failed during its first year implementation. Students, teachers, parents and administrators are against the program,” he said.

Kabataan Party-list vowed to intensify the campaign against the K+12 program this school year.

Ridon said that “these dirty tactics sum up how the Aquino administration has approached the issue overall, sneaky and malignant. There are more and more of the Filipino youth becoming keen to his intentions and as such youth in general will not waver in scrapping the K+12 that robs us of our futures.”