ANGELES CITY – The Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) said on Thursday that contractual and part time public school teachers nationwide will be regularized by next year.
ACT Teachers party list Rep. Antonio Tinio said that this will benefit some 47.1 percent of teachers working for state colleges and universities (SUC’s).
Tinio said the regularization of such teachers, including those who get their pay from local government units, would be in line with recent amendments to portions of the 2012 national budget. This is being pushed by his party list and other sectors sympathetic to the plight of teachers.
He said Special Provision No. 8 of the budget law “mandates the regularization of qualified contractual and volunteer teachers.”
“In the hiring of new teachers, whether to fill unfilled or newly created positions, priority shall be given to qualified contractual and volunteer teachers, whether employed by the Department of Education (DepEd) or the local government units,” said Tinio.
“This special provision will be of big help to an overwhelming number of public school teachers. DepEd’s data reveals that at present, there are currently 49,530 locally funded teachers and 19,063 volunteer kindergarten teachers working in our public schools.” he noted.
He lamented that ”these teachers are the most exploited professionals in the government bureaucracy, as they usually work on a contractual basis with no job security, receive compensation below minimum wage, and denied of the benefits and protections, such as Government Service Insurance System and PhilHealth coverage, extended to regular employees.”
Tinio said that “precariously-employed contractual and part-time faculty comprise 47.01 percent of the total teaching force in SUCs.”
“This stark reality compromises the central role of public higher education institutions in the country,” Tinio added.
