In every document on education reform that I’ve read and in practically every education quality forum that I’ve attended, the pivotal role of the community is always emphasized. For example, Key Reform Thrust 1 of the Department of Education’s Basic Education Sector Reform Agenda says that “if schools are to deliver better outcomes in a sustainable manner, the key stakeholders, within the school and the community served by the school, must be enabled and empowered to manage their school-level affairs so that they deliberately and continuously improve the link between their own efforts and their collectively desired educational outcomes. The central insight of this reform thrust is that people most actively and directly involved in and affected by the schools’ operations are the best people to improve the quality of these schools.”

Who are these key education stakeholders? The most obvious ones are the parents and teachers. The duly elected local government is another. In fact, many NGOs involved in community development consider LGU support as a critical - if not essential - component for a successful education improvement effort. Indeed, a progressive local chief executive can do wonders with regard to generating interest and mobilizing resources for a program or project.

The task of improving the quality of basic education in a community however requires a depth of understanding that traditionally comes from a particular type of stakeholder: the higher education institution or HEI.

At a recent forum entitled “The Promise of Redemption: BESRA and the Need for Higher Education Reform, Dr. Maria Serena Diokno said that “we look upon our educational system as a cohesive, coherent learning web. The present segmentation between elementary and secondary education, and between basic and higher education is doing us harm. Higher education faculty often complain about the declining quality of college entrants but do nothing because, they maintain, it is outside the purview of higher education. But it is our problem too, though not of our own making.”

In the province of Pampanga, a Higher Education Institution is leading the way in improving the quality of public schools in their community. Holy Angel University has been very active with 5775, a private-sector led movement whose reform strategy involves organizing local education alliances composed of local businesses, the LGU, the HEI and any NGO or corporate foundation in the area.

These alliances, on their own, have been able to organize local donors’ forums, all with very positive and encouraging results. Local companies have provided grants to fund trainings, reading and in-school feeding programs, while local development partners continue to provide much in-kind, technical support for activities like school-profiling and the development of educational materials.

As of today, 5775 has been able to organize local education alliances in San Isidro, Nueva Ecija, Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya, Iligan City, Iloilo City, Guimaras and of course in the province of Pampanga, where Holy Angel University is.

Dr. Arlyn S. Villanueva, president of Holy Angel University says that the HEI has been an active partner in a 5775 project site in Pampanga for more than two years now. To add some local color, Gov. Ed Panlilio calls their province-wide local alliance PAMIADUANGAN 57-75. Holy Angel University, for its part, extends support to six school districts in Pampanga. Their assistance includes the usual teacher training, supplemental school feeding, and workbook reproduction, in coordination with DepEd of course. They also have a scholarship program for qualified students who normally cannot afford higher education.

Over and above that, HAU has been actively promoting local culture through traveling exhibits of the Center for Kapampangan Studies, the donation of fixtures and books to schools, setting-up of community learning resource centers and training of para-librarians. For an almost inexhaustible and very idealistic supply of volunteers, Holy Angel University turns to its students in the National Service Training Program. They do literacy service and civic welfare activities like tutorials, physical improvement of the school library and fabrication of teaching aids.

Dr. Villanueva adds that “The mere fact that the school has been an active partner of 57-75 until this time is a reflection of the support of the University to help public schools. Aside from helping public schools, it also benefits Holy Angel University as they are feeder schools. Holy Angel University has been helping public schools long before 57-75. All presidents of the school have been supportive [of the public schools] anchored on the founders’ vision of giving quality and affordable education.”

Dr. Diokno meanwhile strongly suggests that the HEI can do so much more. “Higher education must produce college-ready standards so that the missing links of the learning web are identified. Higher education should come up with work-ready standards especially if we are to consider the establishment of community colleges or two-year programs.

“Finally, higher education’s strongest link with basic education is teacher development. We often blame basic education teachers for doing a bad job. But who trained them in the first place?”

Butch Hernandez (butchhernandez@gmail.com) is the executive director of the Foundation for Worldwide People Power, a 57-75 convenor.

(Education Revolution commentary for Saturday, 20 March 2010 originally submitted to and published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, with inputs (for this e-News) from PAMIADUANGAN 57-75.)