Learning the wrong lessons

The private education sector regretted that the Department of Education (DepEd) dropped a brave P6-billion plan to pilot in school year 2025-2026 a decades-old advocacy to give children financial support to begin basic education. The Educational Service Contracting (ESC) and voucher programs already gave such support to students at high school and higher levels. It rejoiced when Congress promised to pass a national Basic Education Voucher Assistance (BEVA) Act for school year (SY) 2027-2028. The law would help expand access to education at the critical K-3 stage when children must, ideally, begin their learning journey. Like the ESC, it would enable private schools to earn income from idle capacity by enrolling children DepEd could not accommodate. It would also help relieve DepEd’s massive classroom backlog.

BEVA is a no-brainer. It exemplifies the public-private complementarity principle to which all sectors give at least lip service. Decades of practice reinforce the principle. Since the ’80s, DepEd and the Private Education Assistance Committee (PEAC) have partnered in running ESC. Tasked in 2013 with implementing the larger senior high school (SHS) voucher program, DepEd simply expanded the scope of its annual PEAC contract. Both House (House Bill No. 4744, March 16, 2026) and Senate (Senate Bill No. 1981, May 4, 2026) bills wisely permitted private entities to assist in BEVA implementation.

But SB 1981 subjected such entities to the government procurement process for bids and awards, prompting concerns that PEAC urgently raised on June 4, 2026 to DepEd and to legislators. To bid as a “service consultant,” for instance, it had to raise from red to platinum its accreditation to the Philippine Government Electronic Procurement System (PhilGEPS). This was doable but difficult to finish in time for SY 2027-2028. Completion of documentation requirements also depended on PhilGEPS and DepEd, whose workload lay beyond PEAC’s control.

But classifying PEAC as “service consultant” misreads its role. It is not peddling a car or computer whose merits DepEd as buyer can test before use and compare with other offers. PEAC has been DepEd’s partner in managing a system that must meet agency goals, but also the varying needs and limitations of private schools, the learners, and their families. No potential competitor has the comparable institutional mission, industry client base and expertise, and proven ground experience. To impose additional tests of dubious need seems useful only as a virtue-signaling device to show that regulators had done due diligence. PEAC thus suggested amendments to preserve the DepEd partnership system for education subsidy programs. To PEAC’s dismay, the draft law that emerged on Sept. 22, 2026 kept the restrictive Senate version.

To be fair, SB 1981 aimed to improve transparency and accountability that PEAC also championed. The Commission on Audit (COA) audits PEAC’s use of public funds and its contract is approved on an annual basis. Sadly, the SHS voucher program implementation has not been perfect. PEAC had no time for the prequalification vetting of schools that it had established for ESC and continues to improve. But this vetting was not part of PEAC’s mandate. DepEd identified the SHS schools cleared to join the program for PEAC to process. The COA audit of SY 2025-2026 flagged 53 payments to unverified beneficiaries, resulting in overpayments of P938,000.

Corruption has a cost. So do regulations. Thus, the need to balance the trade-offs between the rigor of regulations and the impact on results. Stricter but time-consuming rules might have prevented the P938,000 loss on 53 unqualified claimants. How about the costs of the delay or, for some of the 1.2 million student beneficiaries, the loss of financial assistance from a P27-billion subsidy program?

We seem to be learning the wrong lessons from our sorry corruption record. Procurement safeguards did not prevent the scams in Pharmally, DepEd computer purchases, or Department of Public Works and Highways flood protection contracts. Neither did oversight from the highest levels of the bureaucracy and the political structure. These might even have combined to raise the cost of corruption. The more stringent the rules, the higher the level of authority and the fees needed to evade them. Experience suggests that complex rules and powerful regulators raise the incentives to game the system for private gain.

Added documentation requirements will distract DepEd and PEAC from more critical education issues. They will likely push BEVA to 2028, with possibly more delays from the scrutiny of a new government. Meanwhile, thousands among another generation of children will risk losing access to the support they need to improve their learning and their ability to contribute to the country’s development.

But it is not too late. Congress and the President can still act on the 2027 General Appropriations Bill (HB 10858) to include the special provision on general administration support for the co-implementation by DepEd and PEAC of education subsidy programs—including BEVA.