DAVAO CITY—A bill awaiting the President’s signature seeks to address not only the inability of many Filipino families to finish their children’s schooling, but also to ignite the interest of college students to take agriculture courses and help revitalize the large agriculture sector.
Rep. Roman Romulo of Pasig City, who keynoted the 11th National Organic Agriculture Congress here on November 11, said the “Iskolar ng Bayan” bill would help persuade college students to take up courses in agriculture that have seen few enrollees since the fad on nursing and information technology courses took the fancy of Filipino students in the 1990s.
In one visit to Cagayan de Oro City, Romulo said he called on the inclusion of science and technology, as well as the priority courses in the 112 state universities and colleges mandated to absorb the scholars from public high schools.
The country has 112 government high schools that graduate an average of 1.4 million students annually.
Reports from these schools, however, indicate that less than half of the number of graduates would be unable to proceed to college due to lack of finance.
“In the bill, it would accord privilege to the top 10 graduates with scholarship to any state university or college,” he said.
“This means that we would be able to send at least 80,000 more students to college.” He said the bill already passed the bicameral committee “and it now awaits the signature of the President.” Romulo is the chairman of the House committee on higher education.