Teachers in remote provinces are often overlooked in conversations on the education crisis, with their contributions and challenges largely buried and ignored.
CALLS TO solve the education crisis are made every day, but the voices of those who could drive change are often too distant to be heard. While public attention focuses on Filipino students’ poor standardized test scores, the stark disparity in education quality across regions remains only close to the spotlight. Teachers, who bear the brunt of this inequality, are often left in the shadows.
While government initiatives such as the ‘Teachers to the Barrios” program acknowledge these issues, the stories of teachers from remote schools are still struggling to be heard.
Learning on unstable ground
For Grace Bataluna, an elementary school teacher at Punta Princesa Elementary School in Cebu City, existing facilities and educational resources are inadequate in meeting students’ diverse needs. “Nowadays, children’s learning needs are far greater—they keep asking for things we cannot produce,” says Bataluna.
Even external infrastructure severely impedes students’ ability to get to school. Monica Daapong, a junior high school teacher at St. Therese School of Barangay Miarayon in Bukidnon, shares the daily hardships her students face. “May mga iba diyan na naglalakad ng two hours, three hours para lang makapunta sa school (Some [students] walk for two or three hours just to get to school),” she comments.
The problems of road maintenance and a lack of educational tools are only socioeconomic factors. Beyond these disadvantages, the greater political landscape does not spare many students in far-flung areas, especially those from indigenous communities facing land and natural resource exploitation.
Caught in the landslide
On November 28, 2018, a Salugpungan school shutdown prompted former Bayan Muna representative Satur Ocampo and Alliance of Concerned Teachers Partylist representative France Castro to rescue 14 Lumad students and their teachers, who had been traveling in the rain for three hours along a road to nowhere.
Despite their selfless act, Ocampo and Castro were declared guilty of endangering minors and child abuse by the Tagum City Regional Trial Court last July 3.
For activists, this verdict is further proof of the injustice against the indigenous Lumads and their advocates, with their children caught in the fray of the government and multinational corporations seizing their lands.
The constant threat of displacement looms over the sizable population of Lumad students in St. Therese. “Luoy kaayo (It’s pitiful),” Daapong adds, noting that a handful of her students can no longer afford tuition as their families have been thrown out of their farmlands.
Even if they do manage to keep their land, making a sustainable living from it is also difficult. The constant price fluctuation of high-value crops—the main source of income for Lumad families in Miarayon—leave farmers at the mercy of middlemen who often undervalue their produce with the absence of a suggested retail price on farm products.
Last May, an “impossible” heat wave also struck the region, leaving farmers with Php 9.5 billion in damages from a carbon footprint they did not create.
Amid these challenges, Daapong ensures her students learn about critical issues such as climate change and land ownership. “Kinahanglan na matun-an sila na naa silay katungod sa ila land […] na naa ang ila mga rights as Lumads (They need to learn they have rights to their land […] that they have rights as Lumads),” Daapong explains.
A land of opportunity
Both Bataluna and Daapong note a constant roadblock in their teaching career: a lack of financial support.
Bataluna shares that some students go to school with rumbling stomachs, noting times she has given her students money to buy breakfast. As such, she hopes for more funding and better salaries from the government.
Last year, former Department of Education (DepEd) Secretary and Vice President Sara Duterte previously commented that there is not enough budget to cover all of DepEd’s plans to improve the country’s basic education.
For Daapong, the situation is further compounded by the fact that many teachers are Lumads, who are also affected by displacement and violence. Notably, Duterte also padlocked 11 Lumad schools in 2019 for allegedly indoctrinating anti-government propaganda—a claim Lumad advocates deny.
Instances like these make it difficult for Daapong to rely on the government for support. Fortunately, St. Therese is a Jesuit mission school, benefiting from the help and leadership of missionaries and sister schools assigned to them.
While teaching may seem like a hard-knock profession, there is no shortage of love in it. “This is a passion,” Bataluna asserts, calling for the Filipino people to recognize and appreciate an easily forgotten essence of the job.
The education crisis is a constant burden on the backs of our teachers, especially on those who are too far away to be tapped for solutions. Despite this, Bataluna remains firm that the worries and fears “never reach the classroom.” The students are always the focus, from the first one who enters to the last one who leaves. Everything else fades into a distant hum.
