TEA Governance advocacy, where leaders behave in transparent, ethical, and accountable ways.
In almost four decades of service, a former DepEd Undersecretary never lost sight of the need to help the government in the very serious matter of Curriculum and Instruction. He also lectures in webinars, seminars, conferences, public hearings, and technical meetings. Now that he is the SEAMEO INNOTECH Educational Research and Innovation Office Manager, Dr. Diosdado “Dads” M. San Antonio’s door continues to be knocked by many opportunities to pass on his expertise to more and more younger colleagues and spread common sense methods in educational institutions.
Usec Dad’s “TEA” will surely shun those who knock and choose to be untransparent, unethical, and unaccountable, though.
Once quoted by the media as saying, “Yung level ng commitment ng mga kasama nating guro, hindi matatawaran,” (the level of commitment of our fellow teachers is unmatched) San Antonio is one with the teachers in their feelings and always looking for solutions to the various problems faced by the schoolchildren because he, too, was a public schoolteacher before being entrusted with high positions in the Education Department’s regional offices and HQ.
He would almost always co-lead in Curriculum Development; Learning Delivery; Education Assessments; Learning Resources; Teacher Education and Literacy Coordinating secretariats; and Indigenous Peoples Education. And he listens. (Remember when he did not decline questions and one of his pressers was extremely cherishing, “It was among the many options we were considering but noting the objections from our stakeholders, we will no longer propose a two-week break.”)
As a member of the Standing Committee on Basic Education at EDCOM 2 (Second Congressional Commission on Education), San Antonio constantly emphasizes “the value of empowerment as long as both DepEd officials and teachers are fully capacitated.” (Inserting his eager smile after saying that is important; we cannot have that here, anyway.)
Most of his peer-reviewed journal articles were developed out of his experience in doctoral research.
San Antonio fully agreed when a noted economist wrote in part: “It would appear that our country embarked on decentralization of basic education more than two decades ago in 2001, when the reorganized Department of Education (DepEd) supposedly adopted School-Based Management (SBM) as a governance framework. SBM purportedly transferred power, authority, and resources to the school level, and was piloted in the implementation of foreign-funded projects like Australia’s Basic Education Assistance for Mindanao (BEAM) and Japan’s Third Elementary Education Project (TEEP). Even as analyses showed BEAM and TEEP to have yielded positive effects on pupils’ performance, DepEd, for various reasons, failed to fully implement SBM beyond these pilots. A 2014 assessment by the World Bank observed that most elementary and secondary schools had put in place ‘only a minimum number of arrangements for community participation and for taking action to improve learning outcomes.’
“SBM notwithstanding, the ongoing (EDCOM) found in its first year of research and consultations that schools cannot act in the absence of a memorandum from higher up—a situation stakeholders dub as ‘memocracy,’ a tongue-in-cheek takeoff on ‘democracy.’ Local chief executives (LCEs) have affirmed this, citing how division superintendents often block local initiatives for lack of a memorandum or approval from DepEd superiors. This ‘stems from the long history of centralized and hierarchical control exerted over the DepEd bureaucracy’ (EdCom II Year 1 Report, p. 302-303). This is unfortunate, as EdCom II has heard progressive LCEs embrace education as a core function of LGUs. But ‘absence of a formal policy hinders them from taking a more active role and reaping the benefits of devolution—faster, more focused responses, and innovative solutions that address local context and needs.’” (Habito, 2024)
San Antonio’s research abroad is on SBM and he firmly believes in a “principal-teacher empowerment” to be more specific to the Philippine setting. Before all stakeholders of SEAMEO INNOTECH, he speaks, “It’s our responsibility to empower teachers so they can take risks and be innovative.” (Insert the organization’s technical and related assistance; they are not mere words.)
Policy recommendations for the education sector proceed out of the mouths of laudable people like San Antonio, processes occur in their mouths, and when they make a mistake, it does not leave a bad taste to others’. Go ask their partner research organizations.
San Antonio, who served six Education chiefs, wrote in his social media account that he “will treasure the opportunity to personally know (them) and work with the great DepEd Secretaries of our time.” He began new phases of his career as DepEd retiree on June 30, 2022.
Many teachers do not know San Antonio personally. The good thing is the internet of things. Check out his “Module-based professional development for teachers: A cost-effective Philippine experiment” and other papers, big ideas, and lessons, all out there for all of us to personally ponder his works before asking our bigger questions. We may try to ask him those queries and he will gamely deliver as he did in “The Future of Teaching Controversial Public Issues: The DepEd Response” at UST.
“What’s the use of submitting perfect scores if it’s not the work of your child? As a parent I’ll never do that.” That is how Usec Dads told Christian Esguerra, when asked how to deal with the pandemic woes of both the learners and their parents, adding that other parents saw “nice things in it… nare-review rin sila.”
This recipient of the 2019 Gawad Career Executive Service (CES) Presidential Award also experienced monitoring 35 incidents of errors in self-learning modules as he worked closely with co-leaders at DepEd.
San Antonio precisely detects problems and knows where to start and work to end the problems in the education sector. Like us and his EDCOM standing committee, he hopes and prays: #ItaasAngAntas (improve our levels).
Pangungumusta
Some of my 1996 NHS batchmates who in 2017 donated wall fans, the number of which totaled the number of classrooms in the school before, wanted to know: “Musta [sic] na ang silid-aralan sa tag-init at maiinit na isyu sa edukasyon sa bansa?” My response: “Go visit the classrooms. Magpainit.”
DC Alviar
Professor DC Alviar serves as a member of the steering committee of the Philippine International Studies Organization (PHISO). He was part of National University’s community extension project that imparted the five disciplines of a learning organization (Senge, 1990) to communities in a local government unit. He writes and edits local reports for Mega Scene. He graduated with a master’s degree in development communication from the University of the Philippines Open University in Los Baños. He recently defended a dissertation proposal for his doctorate degree in communication at the same graduate school under a Philippine government scholarship grant. He was editor-in-chief of his high school paper Ang Ugat and the Adamson News.
