Nursing is a Five-Year Course

...at least that is according to CHEd. CHEd wants to spread out the learning period to prevent cramming and to cultivate an atmosphere more conducive to learning. See the news article below for the latest update.

CHEd defends merits of 5-year nursing curriculum

By Shianee Mamanglu

THE proposed 5-year curriculum will de-clog crammed subjects in the existing four years and three summers in nursing education and might even be less costly with the inclusion of review courses in the new program.

Thus, said Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) chair Emmanuel Angeles as he maintained that the merits of the proposed curriculum are beyond compare since it will also make Filipino graduates, particularly in nursing, globally recognized.

"What they (critics) don't know is that parents today are already paying for a five year nursing program. We are not adding another year to the current nursing curriculum. Rather, we are updating the curriculum to weed out unnecessary subjects and make it more responsive to the needs of the students,'' said Angeles.

"We are not adding another year in college because we cannot afford that. We are rationalizing the nursing degree to make it more attuned to the students needs while enhancing the quality of education,'' he added.

Various sectors, including a nursing group, earlier nixed the recommendation of the Presidential Taskforce for Education (PTFE) to implement a five-year curriculum for nursing, citing lack of consultation and economic reasons, among others.

The Philippine Nursing Association (PNA) said that increasing the time allotted for nursing will not help address the more pressing concerns in nursing education such as the lack of laboratory facility in many tertiary schools offering the program.

Dr. Teresita Barcelo, PNA president also noted that efforts in the past on curriculum reforms have yet to be successfully implemented.

Senator Chiz Escudero had urged CHEd "to work within the existing four-year courses and improve the educational standards without increasing the cost on the part of the students and parents'' rather than impose a new curriculum.

Student organizations such as the National Union of Students of the Philippines (NUSP) and the League of Filipino Students (LFS) also called on CHEd to scrap the idea and instead urged to focus on substandard nursing programs and diploma mills mushrooming all over the country.

Angeles bewailed the criticism, saying that most of those who opposed the plan did not even bother to know the details of the proposed curriculum.

"At present, to cover all the important professional courses, the last two years of college is crammed with too many courses that are not conducive to an effective learning process. The result is that graduates are ill-prepared and more than 50 percent fail in the board examination. In some programs, more than 2/3 fails the licensure exams," explained Angeles.

With the new curriculum, he said students will do away with the "crammed courses" and will have more time to study.

In terms of cost, Angeles said that students and parents might likely benefit from the proposed curriculum since review courses are already part of it.

"Students will no longer enrol in review centers, which sometime charged exorbitant fees, to prepare for their licensure exams,'' he added.

Citing the Bologna Accord, Angeles said the number of years a student has to stay in school is from 12 to 16 years. This means that a student shall have 10 years of basic education or more and five years of higher education. In other countries, they have up to Grades 7 to 11 in basic education.

Currently, only the Philippines and Botswana adopts a 10 year education system. Countries in Europe, the United States and in most Asian nations implement a 12 to 13-years education system.

Commissioner Nenalyn Defensor said the Philippines should aim for global standards if it wants to be competitive and acknowledged globally. "I don't think we use Botswana as international benchmark. Dapat yung global requirement ang susundin natin,'' she said, adding she was advised in an international forum to adopt the 5-year curriculum to meet the demands of global education.

She said the PTFE was only "formalizing'' and "restructuring'' the curriculum to pattern it with international requirements.

"It (5year curriculum) should not be a big deal. Matagal ng five years ang engineering and architecture. Yung sa nursing, dati ng five years din yan. We are just formalizing it,'' she said.
The PTFE, tasked to assess, plan and monitor the entire education system by virtue of Executive Order 652, is composed of Education Secretary Jesli Lapus, Presidential Adviser for Education Dr. Mona Valisno, Ambassador Donald Dee, TESDA Secretary Buboy Syjuco and Ateneo president, Fr. Bienvenido Nebres, who is also the chairmain, and Angeles as co-chairman.
The 5-year curriculum is also being recommended for education and other related courses. Moreover, engineering, architecture and commerce are all implemented as five year programs.

CHEd said that consultation with various stakeholders on the proposed 5-year curriculum is still ongoing in some 17 regions across the country.


Article Source: Manila Bulletin