Global connections for a 21st century book club

It is commonly said that literacy is the foundation for all learning. This is true. Very true. As Kofi Annan, former Secretary of the United Nations, once said: “Literacy is the bridge from misery to hope.” If we want our children to succeed – not just in school but in life – they must become literate, both in the traditional sense but also technologically, the latter which I explained in my previous opinion text. Additionally, in order to succeed in our global economy where English is the lingua franca, being literate in the native language is not enough but being proficient in English is also critical. This text explains why Filipinos, unfortunately, are becoming less proficient in English and what action we are taking in order to help reverse this negative trend.

BACKGROUND

To simplify, during the past few decades we have witnessed the exodus of English-proficient Filipino teachers to Japan. More recently, many Filipino teachers were being recruited to Malaysia, Indonesia, and Vietnam (Filipino English teachers are less costly to employ than U.S. English teachers). When that strategy proved to be too expensive a venture for these Asian countries, South Korea deployed a different strategy and began investing in real estate properties all over the Philippines in order to build private schools for South Koreans learning English. In essence, if enough English teachers cannot be recruited from the Philippines to South Korea, then send South Koreans to the Philippines to be taught by Filipino English teachers. Subsequently, even more Filipino English teachers left public schools to pursue English teaching opportunities of foreign students, but now within the borders of the Philippines itself. That brings us to another recent major player on the English teacher recruitment market, namely China.

When China’s economic boom began, millions of newly-minted upper-middle and middle-class Chinese families clamored for a college education for their children. Chinese students arrived in droves in countries where they could be exposed to English, including to the Philippines. However, China quickly changed strategy and deemed it more profitable to speed up the building of more colleges and universities within China to meet the demand for higher education. This ‘nouveau riche’ generation was spending massive amounts of money on anything from expensive wrist watches, to electronic gadgets, to clothing, not to mention on hefty tuitions and school fees, being non-residents in high school and colleges they were (and still are) enrolled in. In addition, the Chinese hired thousands of less expensive English teachers, which means from the very same English teacher pool as in the case of other Asian countries. You guessed it – the Philippines! China’s commitment to hire Filipino English teachers still remains, including through paying solid wages.

When China’s economic boom began, millions of newly-minted upper-middle and middle-class Chinese families clamored for a college education for their children. Chinese students arrived in droves in countries where they could be exposed to English, including to the Philippines. However, China quickly changed strategy and deemed it more profitable to speed up the building of more colleges and universities within China to meet the demand for higher education. This ‘nouveau riche’ generation was spending massive amounts of money on anything from expensive wrist watches, to electronic gadgets, to clothing, not to mention on hefty tuitions and school fees, being non-residents in high school and colleges they were (and still are) enrolled in. In addition, the Chinese hired thousands of less expensive English teachers, which means from the very same English teacher pool as in the case of other Asian countries. You guessed it – the Philippines! China’s commitment to hire Filipino English teachers still remains, including through paying solid wages.

CURRENT STATUS

The worse scenario is beginning to unfold: the Philippines is falling behind many other Asian nations in building our human resources and human capital: proficient, literate, and critical thinkers in the English language who can easily be trained to be effective communicators even in the language of 21st century technologies such as coding, data science, and data analysis. Despite the need for a major shift in how the country functions in this area, the Philippine government continues to operate as “business as usual” in its attitude towards exporting tens of thousands more Filipino English teachers who will benefit other countries competing with the Philippines in the global economy, many teachers who are the cream of the crop. The Philippines provides the education while other nations and their students are benefitting from it. The edge in English education the Philippines once had is fading away. However, there are calls for a renewed emphasis on English education as other Asian nations are approaching the Philippines in terms of English proficiency among their populations. Meanwhile, blame is flying why the Philippines ended up in this declining state in the first place.

RENEWED FOCUS ON ENGLISH PROFICIENCY

As a direct result of the declining English proficiency in the Philippines, the U.S.-based non-profit organization Pinoy Reading Buddies (PRB) is working with many schools, teachers, and Departments of Education on English literacy and proficiency on location in the Philippines. In its latest effort, PRB is partnering with another U.S. based non-profit organization, Technology for Tomorrow (T4T), to provide programs online in order to maximize the reach and minimize the cost.

As a collaborative project, we are currently piloting an online book club with approximately 15 teachers around the Philippines. The book club focuses on activities that promote five thinking while reading skills in order to encourage higher level thinking during the educational process as per Bloom’s Taxonomy. The goal is to engage participating teachers to read and build a sense of engagement in what they are reading as well as immerse teachers in speaking English while building vocabulary. The five thinking skills we are focusing on are: visualizing, predicting, asking questions, making connections, and summarizing. Not only are these skills important in order for Filipinos to become more engaged and proficient readers, they are also directly connected with the critical 21st Century Skills, primarily with the 4 C’s, but even C number 5. In the process, we are also introducing the participating teachers to several new technologies in order to integrate technology in the English literacy learning process and make that important connection as well.

It’s obvious and supported by various facts and data that the Philippines has two significant education challenges that must be addressed in order for the nation to not lose any more ground, including to other nearby Southeast Asian nations such as Malaysia and Thailand: implement a structured, high quality technology education program as well as a high quality English proficiency education program. Those can certainly be implemented and integrated alongside each other and together with other areas of the 21st Century Skills needed to be successful on the global, hi-tech labor market of today and tomorrow.

STAKEHOLDER ACTION

The impressively high level of English proficiency I noticed among the learners in the Social Media Marketing course I recently taught online to adult professionals in Tacloban City is the level of English proficiency we need to achieve for Filipino public school teachers as well. One immediate action Filipino stakeholders can take is to implement programs such as the ones the Pinoy Reading Buddies and Technology for Tomorrow offer, including the integration of both with each other; and just as with technology education, the Philippines can and should tap into global partnerships and online opportunities for English proficiency education as well.

As a concluding thought, to update and contextualize the first paragraph quote by Kofi Annan, proficiency in technology and English is the bridge from misery to hope. Pinoy Reading Buddies and Technology for Tomorrow offer that opportunity and we encourage any school or Department of Education to contact us and partner with us to create necessary programs to help you reach a higher standard and outcomes. Our online book club is only the first step towards that vision that shows how global connections and partnerships can provide a 21st century Reading and English proficiency education for Filipinos.