IT CANNOT be overstated that education must be relevant. It must reflect and respond to social realities. Here’s one suggestion the Department of Education (DepEd) should seriously consider: integrate COVID-19 and pandemic education in the curriculum, which was recently reflected in the President’s order to strengthen “health literacy” among learners after announcing his own condition’s nearing stage 1 cancer.
COVID-19/pandemic education is — to borrow DepEd’s words — an “essential competency” that needs to be deeply integrated in core subjects. Health courses and all other subjects for that matter should not be taught as though they exist in vacuums, lest we risk alienating learners from their experience and survival.
DepEd’s claim of already having health literacy “embedded in various subjects” should be reviewed and accordingly revised to include vital information on the present health crisis. This response indicated complacency on the adequacy of its current curriculum in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic and empowering millions of learners to contribute to stemming its spread.
Ground reports show that learning materials such as the self-learning modules (SLMs) failed to include discussions on COVID-19, except in some locally produced modules in National Capital Region schools and divisions. The modicum of material on COVID-19 and pandemic education seems to be more an initiative of some teachers and local officials, rather than of DepEd. This is further evidenced by the absence of an official directive and decisive steps to ensure the seamless integration of such in the curriculum.
Given that this health crisis affects nearly all cities and provinces in the country, we forward that DepEd’s national office should be leading the agency in ensuring that the country’s education system responds to our people’s needs, especially at this time of unrelenting crises.
DepEd should not be blind to social realities that disadvantage the majority of its constituents, and also to education’s ultimate objective of equipping the youth with knowledge and skills to understand and better the society. Continuing to be oblivious to these pressing needs is tantamount to neglecting the youth and disregarding their potentials to contribute in our fight to surmount these crises.
