SHS vouchers fall short of decongesting public schools, helping poor learners
By Creselda Canda-Lopez
“It’s waste that we don’t solve the problem of congestion because we are randomly giving voucher program to students,” Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian said Department of Education’s senior high school voucher program had mostly benefited non-poor students and largely failed to decongest public schools even as it forked over large sums of money for private schools to absorb students, new data shared during Senate hearing showed.
Described as “wastage” and “leakage” by Gatchalian, DepEd’s voucher program appears to have failed to help at least 542,000 senior high school students considered as “aisle learners” enroll in private schools in school year 2023-2024 alone. Aisle learners refer to students who already count outside regular class size in school.
Meanwhile, DepEd data shows 53% or P7.21 billion of P13.69 billion allocation for senior high school voucher program went to non-poor students in SY 2021-2022, or students whose families earned income less than poverty threshold. This was higher compared to SY 2019-2020, where 39% or P7.30 billion of P18.76 billion budget for senior high school voucher program also went to non-poor students.
These estimates by Gatchalian, chairs Senate basic education panel, similar to findings raised by Commission on Audit in 2018 that Government Assistance to Students and Teachers in Private Education (GASTPE) program SHS vouchers are under was benefiting “non-poor” students due to DepEd’s inability to ensure its efficient implementation.
Gatchalian pointed out during March 20 hearing that DepEd should have established effective “targeting mechanism” to ensure
1.2 million voucher beneficiaries this school year already included 542,000 estimated aisle learners.
Citing data from Annual Poverty Indicators surveys in 2020 and 2021, Gatchalian also said voucher program needs to be “corrected” immediately as 70% of voucher recipients in SY 2021-2022 belonged to non-poor households.
“For me, it’s wastage and leakage…we need to correct this immediately and I plan to raise this during our budget hearing because we have to make sure every centavo allocated to government goes to our poor learners and efficient projects and programs,” he said.
Lawyer Tara Rama of DepEd vowed to review GASTPE’s guidelines to address program’s non-prioritization of poor students, as well as it’s ability to target students in overcrowded public schools.
Similar to COA findings five years ago, Gatchalian described matter as one government “is not being efficient.”
Since it introduced grades 11 and 12 under K to 12 program, DepEd has relied on its senior high school voucher program to move financially challenged students from overcrowded public schools to private schools through voucher subsidies.
These vouchers range from P8,750 to P22,500 a year, depending on student’s household income and location, with expectation that student’s families would cover excess.
However, 2018 performance report on SHS voucher program by COA found DepEd “does not check whether or not students are actually underprivileged.”
COA said, in “promoting greater choice,” DepEd had also extended financial assistance to students coming from non-poor families. Philippine Center of Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) report in 2020 found voucher subsidies fell short in helping students enroll in private schools due to economic difficulties brought by COVID-19 pandemic, revealing inadequacy of department’s main financial assistance program for senior high school students.
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