‘Bakit pa may K to 12?’ Tulfo hits ‘disregard’ in employing senior high school graduates

Senator Raffy Tulfo on Monday raised the supposed discrimination against senior high school graduates in terms of employment and questioned the intent of the K to 12 curriculum.

“Sa classified ads na naghahanap ng employee, palaging, almost always ‘must be college graduate.’ Dini-disregard na agad ‘yung mga graduate ng senior high. Even parang clerk typist lang, receptionist lang – ‘must be college graduate.’ This has to be changed. Na parang agad agad, discriminated agad itong mga graduates ng senior high,” Tulfo said in a Senate hearing.

(In most of the classified ads, almost all the job vacancies require that the applicants should be a college graduate. Those who finished senior high school are mostly disregarded even in jobs like receptionists, clerk typist, among others. This has to be changed because it appears that senior high school graduates were discriminated against.)

He noted that in the United States being a college graduate is not a requirement for such types of job.

Citing data from the Department of Education, Tulfo said only about 10% of senior high school graduates were employed after their secondary education.

“So bakit meron pa tayong K to 12? Dito pala e pag nag-K to 12 ka only 10% of you guys that will graduate this year will get a job,” he said.

(What’s the purpose of our K to 12 curriculum if only 10% of our senior high school graduates can land a job?)

He then urged the Department of Labor and Employment to come up with an exclusive program for senior high school’s employment and encourage the companies to hire them.

DOLE Undersecretary Carmela Torres said they had conducted a job fair for K to 12 graduates and there were about 9,000 job vacancies last December 2022. However, only 116 were hired as cashiers, sales agents, and service crew.

“Ito ‘yung mga areas na pwede silang ma-hire and those are some areas which we can enhance their competencies and skills kasi don sila na-hire…we intend to do it again this year. Maraming vacancies e,” she said.

(These are the areas where we can hire them and enhance their skills. We intend to do another job fair this year because there are a lot of vacancies.)

For Senate basic education committee chairman Sherwin Gatchalian, there is a need to certify Grade 12 students under the technical-vocational-livelihood track to improve the employment prospects of these graduates.

To recall, Gatchalian pushed for the funding of the certification of senior high school students under the proposed 2024 national budget.—AOL, GMA Integrated News