It seems logical that good education can only be acquired if one have enough money to spend because all supporting factors require funds and other resources to be realized, so much so in a developing country as the Philippines. One of the most evident problems is the poor having less access to good education. Good education require both the hardware (school buildings, books, supplies, equipment) and software (trained and dedicated teachers, healthy citizens) components that require funds from both the government and the people themselves.
Majority of those living below the poverty line are not able to finish basic education. Even if elementary and even high school education is provided free in the country, the very poor do not have enough money to spend for jeepney fares and “baon” so they are forced to stop and earn first to satisfy their stomach. This is particularly true in remote barrios in the provinces where schools could not be suitably located to serve far areas.
These thinly populated areas are the one most neglected or even forgotten by the local and national government. Considering that schools are near their residences and travelling is not a problem, these children of the poor do not have enough nutrition for their body and mind to develop properly and normally. Coupled with the lack of time to study because they also have to work to earn a living they may not be able to cope up and again loose interest and then stop studying.
Lastly, considering further that these poor children have enough nourishment and also enough time to study, insufficient school facilities like library, computers, laboratories and other teaching aids like audio visual rooms are usually not adequately provided for, if at all, in most public schools where poor students study. Several students share dilapidated books and obsolete computers with pirated softwares. Science experiments are imagined due to lack of materials and apparatus. Speech labs are limited to the very rich cities like Makati.
In a Third World country like the Philippines, honest to goodness good education can only be accessible by those who have the monetary means -the upper class and middle class. Several of the very poor that have the luck, shear fate and the determination and perseverance could succeed on achieving it especially with the support of dedicated and righteous teachers. But even this would be very elusive if major reforms in government are not instituted. It is not an easy task, because it is like a chicken-and-egg thing between education and poverty. But as for me, address poverty first!
