Wednesday, June 11, 2014

The Nine Common Human Needs: Functional Literacy

Education in an Age of Spirit and Thought.

The state of our Public Education in the 21st Century must change with the times. The advancement of the Filipino spirit through the pursuit of academic excellence is the central reason why as a Nation we maintain a public and a private school system - right alongside each other.

Education in our Nation is not exclusive to either public or private domains. Neither is Education as an institution of the Philippine State obscure about its principles and intention. This Republic shall and will maintain a system of education prescribed by our Constitution (Article XIV). 
---<--@

We shall forgo the mindset that private schools are better than public schools.

This is a remnant thought left behind by a system of things past - a manifestation of colonial mentality, if you will - wrought about by an unjust division in our Nation (between conqueror-and-conquered or those-who-subdue-and-those-who-are-subdued) that is founded upon a reality in our midst that no longer exist...

And have not existed for some time now.

Let me also re-iterate that while we struggle with these remnant thoughts, particularly about those past evils that our Nation and its spirit was forcibly subject to, we should not place any blame on things that no longer materially exists - our colonial past is not an evil to blame, but a memory we should bear in mind to properly place into our living remembrance of these present times. 

We can not hate the past for being what it was: Spain is to be loved and respected because we are a people of the Now and live not in the past, accounting before God, only the promises of the living moment, imploring Him to bring this Nation unto a morning worthy of our Flag and Anthem.

And in this moment - forever, mabuhay - there are only those who we elect to govern and those who elect who choose to be governed by them - freely, in a free, fair and representative system of Country wholly and faithfully embraced by a State that is entirely the belonging of the Filipino people - past, present, and forever.

Therefore, our public school system will co-exist harmoniously with our private school system united in their synergistic commitment to Academic Freedom.

Private schools are mostly specialist schools. They adopt means and methods particular to their design and are possessed of their own specific institutions accordingly. 

But our public schools shall be built as foundation institutions of academic and civic fluency.

And the entire Educational system in this Nation shall and must be re-dedicated in the service of the Filipino youth upon whose strength and spirit every new dawning that shall, God-helping, break upon this Land of the Morning entirely depends - in all our behalf.

Human ignorance is profoundly spiritual in nature. Knowledge is to us as time, only a borrowed thing. What profits the labor of our Education is how it shall resolutely and faithfully serve, in the name of our children in the Nation, the Truth.

We must consider this, my brothers and sisters of the Promise, when we think of Functional Literacy in the Nation: Truth is not in the eye of the beholder. Truth is what beholds us back.

This is decidedly a subject possessed of more breadth and depth than can be handled in this work.

However, for our intents and purposes, we shall limit our thoughts to the renewal and re-dedication of Public Education in the Nation as an institution of the Philippine State entirely. This Republic being what it is, private institutions of learning shall then be made to freely and creatively compete. God-helping, with our successes.

I shall commit for us here, some thoughts I have been nurturing regarding the matter. Let me also add that it is good that I commit these into writing now - that others with a similar persuasion to improve on Education in our Nation may freely add upon these thoughts.

K-12 Standard, National

Civics                                                   Academics
- Open Learning                                   - Structured Learning
- Realized "In"                                      - Recognized "From"
- Learner with Nation                           - Teacher with Learner
- Core Competency                             - Core Curriculum
- Informal Transmission                        - Formal Instruction

Human Fluency is Academic and Civic Fluency exercised in unison. 

Foundation Thinking - IS - the Foundation. 

The product of this Education system is in the students we successfully transform into the dominant spirit and thought that must pervade their chosen fields of service.

In common, this we shall call Human Fluency.

We seek shall to graduate human beings who are professional citizens and life-long learners in their own right - knowledgeable both in heart and mind.

They shall know their profession and know what to love in their Nation (and in other Nations) and therefore, apply themselves accordingly.

They shall upon graduation be - 

Work Ready - and - Career Worthy (or) College Ready - and - Career Worthy (and their Education shall be esteemed) Global in Currency - Local in Scope.

"Hindi hilaw, hindi over-qualified - talagang tamang tamang tama lang."

The fruit of this vision
in the Reality of the Nation is
Human Fluency.
---<--@

The Nine Common Human Needs