Education for public opinion

Title

Creator

Carreon, Manuel L.

Language

English

Year

1936

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Abstract

Task of training a citizenry informed and intelligent followership belongs to public school teachers.

Fulltext

g WOMAN’S HOME JOURNAL " Manila, 'Jun * Education for Public Opinion WHAT is the part that education and the teacher play in the creating, moulding, or affect ing of public opinion? What are the schools and the teach ers doing with their opportun ities and responsibilities in moulding and directing public opinion in the right direc tion? The Teachers’ Role There are nearly thirty thousand teachers in the Phil ippines. We find the teachers not only in the big centers of population but also is the most remote barrios. The number of children reached by the teachers and the num ber of fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters in the family of these children run into millions when we take into account that we have over one million children en rolled in the public schools today. You can see, therefore, what a tremendous power the schools and teachers can exert in the creating, moulding, or affecting of public opinion. Public Education and Literacy The Monroe Survey Comis sion in its report in 1925 made the startling observa tion that we were getting only a Grade-Two education. During the ten years that fol lowed through the extension of elementary education to the remotest barrio, we should have been able to raise the standard of this achieve ment. The 1903 Census re ports less than 45 per cent of our population as being literate, or able to read and write English, Spanish, or the vernacular. The 1918 Census (15 years later) reports an increase to about 50 per cent and we have every reason to expect that in the next 15 years or in 1933, we should have increased this percent age to at least 60 per cent (some have put it at 70 per cent) of our total population over ten years of age. While Task of Training a Citizenry for In formed and Intelligent Follower ship Belongs to Public School Teachers By Dr. Manuel L. Carreon Member, National Educational Council this is still low as compared with the percentage of lite racy in countries like the United States, Japan, New Zealand, and the leading pow ers of Europe, we have every reason to feel happy over the progress made in this direc tion. Minimum Educational Goal In several school divisions, the goal of barrio education has been set at establishing not merely a one-or two-grade school under one teacher in a one-room school, but a com plete primary school in which two teachers are assigned, each of whom to a room, and each of whom to handle two grades. It seems this ideal should be the goal for the Philippines. In our present stage of political and econo mic development, it will be worth our while to formulate and execute a plan extending over a period of a five, ten, or more years whereby a com plete primary school may be established in every commun ity, rural or urban, capable of maintaining the necessary pupil attendance. To me the only hope of having an intelligent public opinion is the raising of the cultural and educational level of our population to at least a fourth grade education. It will be then and only then that we can hope to bring about and maintain in the Philippines a governmental machinery, an economic structure, an educa tional system, and a social or ganization based upon the soundest of principles and brought about by an inform ed and an intelligent public opinion. Training for Followership Dr. W. 0. Bagley, outstand ing American leader of edu cational thought, once said: “What America needs today is not a Mussolini, but the raising of the cultural and intellectual level of the Amer ican people to such an extent that they would not need the guidance, much less the dic tatorship, of a Mussolini.” Well may I say in this con nection that what we need in the Philippines today is not only a wise, a judicious, a far-sighted, and an unselfish leadership, but also, far more important perhaps, an in formed and an intelligent fol lowership capable of setting up the right type of leader ship to guide as in this mo mentous period of our na tional history. Public school teachers have shown a wholesome interest not only in their professional growth but also in the econo mic and social problems of the community in which they live. Individually and collectively, public school teachers have manifested in more ways than one that they count and can be counted upon in the de termination and solution of vital problems affecting them not only as teachers but also as private citizens. The task briefly outlined here, the task of training a citizenry for in telligent followership capable of expressing an informed and an unbiased public opinion is a task demanding urgent at tention from public school teachers whether acting indidually or organized collect ively. Constitutional Provisions Our Constitution provides for an adequate system of public education offering at least free primary instruction and citizenship training for adults. The responsibility of the school and the teacher is obviously two-fold; namely, to bring in every child of pri mary school age into the school, and secondly, to assist in a program of adult educa tion that would drive home to our adult citizens the respon sibilities of Filipino citizen ship. The Teacher as Moulder of Public Opinion It is in the latter where the teacher and the school can exercise a tremendous influ ence in the formation of a sound public opinion. By con tacts with the children in the classroom, on the p 1 a ygrounds, in the school pro grams, on excursions, and in other extra-curricular activ ities, by contact with the par ents in parent-teachers meet ings, in community assem blies, and on other occasions, the teacher can exert his in fluence in insuring that the people get a fair and accu rate knowledge of the facts around them, and thereby help them form a public opin ion that is both intelligent and independent. Those who are in favor of centralized united action are tempted at once to advocate a uni-personalistic, oligarchic, autocratic, or dictatorial form of management. Those be lievers of the democratic ideal agree with Dr. Bagley that what a country needs is an enlightened public opinion, an enlightened citizenry that will be able to discriminate between right and wrong, be tween just and unjust, be tween good and bad. In this important task of creating the right type of public opin ion and the right type of eit* zenry, the school teacher can pignificantjr

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