Miseducation of Filipino People (not the one you're looking for)

The miseducation of the Filipino people refers to the inadequate or misguided education that many Filipinos receive. This miseducation has contributed to a number of problems in the Philippines, including a lack of critical thinking skills, a lack of understanding of important social and political issues, and a lack of knowledge about the country’s history and culture.

One of the main causes of the miseducation of Filipinos is the lack of emphasis on critical thinking skills in the education system. Many schools in the Philippines focus on rote memorization and the repetition of facts, rather than encouraging students to think critically and independently. As a result, many Filipinos are unable to analyze and evaluate information, and are instead prone to accepting ideas and beliefs without questioning them.

Another factor contributing to the miseducation of Filipinos is the lack of focus on social and political issues in the education system. Many schools in the Philippines do not adequately teach students about the country’s history, culture, and current social and political issues. This lack of knowledge leaves many Filipinos uninformed and unable to engage in meaningful discussions and debates about important issues facing the country.

Furthermore, the miseducation of Filipinos is also perpetuated by the lack of access to quality education for many people in the country. The Philippine education system is plagued by underfunding, overcrowded classrooms, and inadequate resources, which makes it difficult for many students to receive a proper education. As a result, many Filipinos are unable to fully develop their knowledge and skills, and are unable to reach their full potential.

In order to address the miseducation of Filipinos, it is important for the Philippine government and educational institutions to focus on providing quality education that emphasizes critical thinking and knowledge of social and political issues. This will require significant investments in the education system, as well as reforms to ensure that all students have access to quality education. Additionally, it will require a shift in the way that education is approached, so that it is not just about memorizing facts, but also about developing the skills and knowledge necessary to think independently and engage with the world around us.

My College Life: In a Nutshell

Throwback when I was in high school, I really don’t know what course I will take in college. First I thought I like to work in an office as a business person or to work as a kitchen person. Then, there was a time where I was in third year that I got inspired by my teacher in English who passed away few months ago, who teaches us more than the lesson she prepared for us. She tough us good values, how to make decisions, and the possible risk of it and accept the consequences of every decision we've made. She said “I don’t care if you will not remember the lessons we have discussed, but make sure that the values you've learned from me should manifest to your future. If not, I’ll rise from my grave and haunt you”.


That moments leads to my mind that I like to be a teacher, I want to be what she was. So I took Bachelor of Secondary Education – Social Studies.
My first year as an education student wasn't good, its boring, maybe we don’t have major or professional subjects yet that focuses in teaching profession. But all changed when the next school years when we started to have professional subject accompanied by field studies. That was the time I enjoy and become excited to finish schooling and to become a real licensed teacher. We have studied theories, teaching strategies and more about teaching profession. We have attended seminars and conventions that enrich our knowledge that could help us in the near future.
Practice Teaching

Before, I thought I already know everything I need for my future profession, but I was wrong. The theories and things that I have learned from the past years of my studies is very idealistic far beyond the reality of teaching experience. I have learned all lot from my mentor / coordinating teacher, well to her co-teachers and to my friends around me. By observations, I learned many things. I have dissected things that I need to do and I need to avoid. My mentor thought me how to deal in extreme situations and how to separate personal emotions from work. Teachers should maintain its distance and limitation from the students in order to be respected by them. 

Before, I thought I already know everything I need for my future profession, but I was wrong. The theories and things that I have learned from the past years of my studies is very idealistic far beyond the reality of teaching experience. I have learned all lot from my mentor / coordinating teacher, well to her co-teachers and to my friends around me. By observations, I learned many things. I have dissected things that I need to do and I need to avoid. My mentor thought me how to deal in extreme situations and how to separate personal emotions from work. Teachers should maintain its distance and limitation from the students in order to be respected by them. 

At first, I was very nervous and afraid. It is because of my condition. The first things that comes on my mind was how will survive this,    how will I respond on the sarcasms of my students, how will I gain respect from them. That was the hardest time of my life as a student teacher. Time passes by, I learned how to get rid of that thoughts. I learned how to deal with it, How to illuminate the negative vibes that cross on my mind about myself, I learned so many things.

PH’s Economic Development History

by Bill Patrick Familara (2013)

Long before the arrival of the Spaniards in the Philippine archipelago, the natives have already a socio-political and economic system. Tribes are trading to each other and the foreign relations have been established as free trade is already being done with the neighboring kingdoms and empires like China, Indochina and people from Malay Archipelago. This is in the form of a barter system. In Barter system, people do not use notes and/ or currency to exchange goods and services. What they do is exchanging a good that has the same value to other. For example, I will trade my carabao to you in exchange of 15 sacks of rice. This kind of economic system have been used until the late 1600 when the Kingdom of Spain finally took control on the Philippine Archipelago but limited to the Kingdom of Sulu that was reigned until 1962.
When the Kingdom of Spain successfully took over the archipelago, they established an economic system that brought progress and growth to the colony’s economy. The Manila- Acapulco Galleon Trade opened new opportunities to the Indios to acquire new knowledge and skills. This Galleon trade last until 1815 when the Mexican War of Independence put a permanent stop to the galleon trade route. This marked the first time trade truly became global, wherein Asian goods /BILL PATRICK FAMILARA (c)/ were sold to Latin America. It's the first instance in human history when all trade-routes across the planet interlinked, arguably making Manila the world's first Global City and the Manila Galleon route the prototype for global trade.

During the time of the galleon trade, Manila was exclusively trading its goods to Acapulco and limited to the rest of the world. When the Kingdom of Spain was defeated by the British Kingdom, Manila opens its trade to the world market. Thus, the exchange of goods and services expands to the rest of the world. That we could see Manila as the only progressive city in Las Islas Filipinas for the reason that the existence of Hacienda system is being observed and the monopoly of a certain product like Tobacco, Corn and Sugar cane are the only products being produced in the large part of the Filipina Archipelago. This kind of system hinders to the economic development of the provinces.

After the Treaty of Paris, The Republica de Filipinas fall under the control of the United States and successfully established new and modern economic system, adapting what is being used in European and American countries. United States flooded the Filipino Market by their products. They redressed the Philippines from a medieval like society into Americanized one. They introduced more diverse and free trade but limited to the United States market.

After World War 2, The Philippines finally got its independence to the United States. But this time, the capital city was fully devastated by the war. The economy of the newly recognized country had collapsed. And the role of the government is to re-established to fundamental pillars of the economy.
In Marcos time, The Philippines was considered as one of the most progressive country in terms of economy next to Japan. The Bagong Lipunan trend was introduced and said “Ang Pilipinas ay Muling Dadakila”. He established strong foreign economic relations to the far eastern or West Asian countries. Thus, strong foreign direct investments were put in the country’s economy. Series of building new infrastructures like bridges, roads, convention centers, trains helped allot especially on the issue of unemployment when thousands of Filipinos were employed that time.

After what they so-called successful peaceful revolution, Cory Aquino was proclaimed as the new president of the republic. On her time, the economy of the country was freeze. Series of insurgences occurred that resulted to the collapsed of the basic economic foundations of the country. That time, the whole archipelago undergone on a dark age like period.

Nowadays, after the former president Gloria Macapagal Aroyo successfully rebuild and re-established the fundamentals of the Philippine economy. The current presedent is in easy term on facilitating and keeping this track into a good way.

(sorry for grammatical errors)

It's About Charter Change

Charter change commonly known as cha-cha is an issue that can be traced back since 1998 during the last few months of Pres. Ramos in office.  This is not an issue of amendment of the constitution and what the law in the country allows but the morality behind the real motives why the president wanted to have this cha-cha.

According to the people who are against cha-cha, it is just a move of the outgoing president to prolong their power just like what Marcos did especially when he tried to have a permanent dictatorship over the country.  And according to the church leaders during the time of Ramos that it is just a part of the ploy to keep him in office when his term expires.

The political perspective argues that the constitutions must express the will of the people. As a democratic country, the people have the right to amend the constitution in accordance to the law. By this the amendment of the constitution should be for the benefit of all and not for a specific person.

The question is what is the rationale of the government to decide to amend the constitution? Yes, there are many social issues that our country is facing right now. Charter change may be helpful in solving this issue but the truth lays on the good governance of f our leaders. San Marino, a country inside Italy has the oldest constitution still in effect until now, dated back 1600. Their constitution is very old but why they did not even tried to change it? The reason might be they have a good leaders and law abiding citizens. They just upgrading and adding some provisions to their constitution but the total revision of it as a whole is not been put in their mind.

They say that cha-cha is needed by the Filipinos, is it? It is no matter what constitution we have if the leaders of our country don’t even respect it and protect it, it is nothing. The main idea is that we Filipino must protect value and follow our constitution as well our country with all our heart and our entire straight that good given to us.

Understanding Poverty

by B.P. Familara

[A family living under the bridge of CAVITEX]

Poverty is an economic status of being poor. There are many factors why poverty exists. According to C. Wright Mills, an American sociologist, poverty has two main reasons why it exists these are the personal troubles and public issues. Personal troubles are the issues of every individual why they can’t find a job. Some are not qualified to the job they’re applying in, some are over qualified to have that job, but most often it is about the attitude of the person applying a job or their attitude towards work. For example, if the town has population of 200 and 180 of it is employed and only 20 are not. It is an issue that the government cannot do about because there are a lot of opportunities but these 20 unemployed might having a hard time in finding a job. In contrast to this, if 180 are unemployed and only 20 are employed this is what we called Public issue. This is a manifestation that the social structure of a society has been collapsed. There are many work forces but here are less job opportunities combined with some personal troubles.

Poverty in our country is a product of the two realities, the economic underdevelopment and the reality of inequality. The unequal distribution of wealth in our country affects great to the development of our economy. The rich becomes richer while the poor becomes poorer. The amount of assets that our economy produces is not enough to follow the level of sophistication of the technology that is being used by the mainstream. The result of this is that our locally made product cannot compete to the world market due to the durability and price differences, imported good often cheaper than homegrown / locally produced goods, that often resulting to bankruptcy of local businesses.

After world war two, Philippines are next to Japan in terms of economic development but the faith of our country is not that good as Japan.  The question lies on my mind how come we did not develop like Japan? Somehow, it lies on foreign relationship with the US. American put their Military bases that hindered us to explore our full potential. Our preferential agreement in the US market for Philippine sugar, for example, shielded the favored Filipino farmers from urgency of competition and modernization. Comparing the value of Peso to American dollars usually makes us blind to the real situation and to think an illusion of prosperity, prosperity that in reality we can’t even feel. We have not paid attention in the modernization of our agriculture industry and we did not even build more modern infrastructure. Our public education system before was farther good than the private educational institutions. However, we let it to be deteriorated. Nowadays, we choose to educate our children in private schools rather than in the public, thinking that they will be trained well in on that institution.

On the time of the presidency of Marcos, problems during his governance took over his efforts in economic development. He loaned billions of peso for the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan, but the money was misused and the world economy entered into recession that resulted to our government cannot pay it. His modernization project also failed because it is untenable. Despite the fact that late President Marcos did wrong, we should honor him for his efforts to rebuild and develop our country, though it was not successful.

Our bad experiences during Marcos about modernization make us blind for the reality that we need a development. We became paranoid, our democratic rights and freedom. During the presidency of the first lady president, Cory Aquino, series of coups‘d’état hindered our economic development and frightens foreign investors to invest to our country.   This coup makes our economy frost while our population is growing fast. Thus, it results to social imbalance and the collapsed of our social structure.

The dilemma nowadays is that the growing economy cannot actually feel by the poor, but only by the few elites that actually controls it. Yes, after the first decade of the 21th century, and according to the news reports, our economy have grown and we are now 3^rd next to Thailand and China which is the 1^st in Asia’s fast growing economy.

The solution to those problem is to the government should provide and meet the basic needs of our society. By rebuilding social trust, the fight for corruption is one of the best example, and re-establishing the social structure of opportunities. Re-establishing it absolutely will produce more job opportunities, but it is still depending on the cooperation and participation of the people to this move.

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This article is based on the article published by the Philippine Daily Inquirer,on July 15, 2000 with the same title

The Philippine Story

30,000 years ago the first people arrived in the Philippines by land bridges. These are the Negritos, years passed races such as Arabic and Chinese followed. Small kingdoms has formed starting the 900 AD. Some of those are the kingdom of Zabag, Tawalisi Kingdom and the Kingdom of Tondo.

The next 1000 years began the leadership of the Rajah that lasted from 1000 to 1521. Some of the Rajanate Kingdom recorded on history is the Rajanate of Seludong. Upon the arrival of the Spanish conquistadores became Manila and Namayan Rajanate and its capital is Maysapan now in Santa Ana, and the Rajanato of Butuan .

In the Visayas region was the leadership of Datus that is known to have first had code of the Act more popular The Kodego of Kalantiao or Code of Kalantiao.

While in Mindanao, the Islam religion scattered easily and the establishments of the Sultanate Kingdoms. These are the Sultanate of Sulu which is capital is Jolo that reigned from 1400's until 1917, and the Sultanate of Maguindanao, its capital is the Marawi that reined from 1500's to 1800's.

But in 1521 when the Spanish arrived in the Philippines led by Ferdinand Magellan the first Holy Mass was celebrated on March 31.1521 on the island of Mazaua. The expedition of Spain was not ended after the fall of Magellan. Four more expedition was set sail to the Philippines, these are LOAISA (1525), Cabot (1526), ​​Saavedra (1527), Villalobos (1542), and Legaspi (1564). In 1543, Ruy Lopez de Villalobos conquered the Islands and named it Las Islas Felipinas under the name of King Philip II of Spain. They established the first school and University, Place of worship, Bridge, and buildings. People who is native in the colony is called Indio, or in English, Idiot.

In 1565, Indias Orientales Españolas was established and became the capital is Cebu from 1565 to 1571 and moved to Manila in 1571 until 1898.

In 1762 to 1764 after the weakening of the kingdom of Spain, large area of the colony was taken by the British Empire. That was in the Seven Years War, ended the war because of the Treaty of Paris and after a year, Britain surrendered Manila and other part of the Colony to Spain.

Revolution started in 1896 with the formation of La Liga Filipina and the Kataas-taasang, Kagalang-galangang Katipunan ng̃ mg̃á Anak ng̃ Bayan also known as KKK that was led by Andrés Bonifacio, Ladislao Diwa, Teodoro Plata, Darilyo Valino, Rayalpapa Guia and Dano Belica, all of them are members of La Liga that was established by Jose Rizal.

When the revolution succeeded, the first Philippine Republic was established in 1899 and by 1901 Americans came to take over the Philippines because Spain sold the Philippines to America at a cost of 20 million Dollars by the Treaty of Paris. Year 1899 also at the outbreak of the war of Filipinos and Americans ended in 1902.

1934 has also established the Commonwealth of the Philippines (Mancomunidad de las Filipinas) and also dissolved in 1946 after World War II.

In December 8, 1941 ten hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, Japanese invaded the Philippines and became the State Puppet of Japan. And in September 2, 1945, Philippines were again under the United States.

The Third Republic was established in 1946 that lasted until 1965 also. When Marcos was elected in the position as president the economy was deteriorated and series of protest and violence spreads all over the country. As an answer to his problem, he declared Martial Law, and the beginning of the 4th Republic of the Philippines to take turn until 1986.

After the fall of the regime of Marcos, Corazon Aquino was elected as the new president of the Philippines after the first EDSA Revolution. In her time was the start of the 5^th Republic.