DepEd’s Mass Promotion: A Bane or Boon

_____________________

A Case Study

Presented to

GLENDA B. TUPAZ, D.A

Eastern Visayas State University

Tacloban City

_____________________

In Partial Fulfilment

of the Requirements for Educ. 532.3

CURRENT TRENDS AND ISSUES IN EDUCATION

Ritche Deloria

Hazel L. Agner

August 2022
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We would like to acknowledge our heartfelt gratitude to Dr. Glenda B. Tupaz as our

Course Professor who has guided us in this work. The guidance and advice carried us through

all the process of writing our case study.

We would also like to give special thanks to our family who have helped us

financially and continuous support, prayers, and understanding while writing our paper.

We also wanted to extend our heartfelt gratitude to the stakeholders of Central

Schools in Poblacion, Abuyog Leyte. We wanted to acknowledge the teachers for allowing us

to do the interview amidst pandemic.

Above all, to our Almighty God for letting us through all the challenges and

difficulties.

H.A.

R.D.

Eastern Visayas State University

Tacloban City

August 2022

iv
 INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

In line with the implementation of the Basic Education Act of 2013 (Republic Act No.

10533), the Department of Education (DepEd) in the Philippines adopted the Policy

Guidelines on Classroom Assessment for the K to 12 Basic Education Program, through

DepEd order No. 73, s. 2012 enclosed in DepEd order No. 8, (see appendix___) issued last

April 1, 2015. New rules on student retention and promotion, as well as how teachers should

handle failed pupils, are included in the DepEd order (Luistro, 2015). Prior to this, on June 4,

2010, the department released DepEd Order No. 47, Guidelines on Mainstreaming the Drop-

Out Reduction Program (DORP) in the Public Secondary Schools, addressing the issue of

drop-out rates in public secondary schools (Valisno, 2010).

New guidelines included in the DepEd regulations transformed how educators and

school administrators handled struggling pupils and SARDOs (Students at Risk of Dropping

Out). These DepEd regulations then gave rise to the concept of mass promotions. It is a topic

that has generated discussion and is indisputably related to pupils' deteriorating academic

performance in both public and private schools (To retain or promote: Asking the right

question, 2014). Rose, Medway, Cantrell, and Marus (1983) concluded that educators all

across the world have noticed a steady deterioration in students' performance on standardized

tests. Beginning in the early 1960s, this was initially noticed, and it has mostly persisted up to

the present. They blamed the lowered academic and promotion standards for the drop in

academic performance. These requirements were based on psychosocial studies that looked at

how the students' emotional and mental health was affected by rigorous academic and

promotion demands. However, as a result of the aforementioned reduction, educators

demanded that tighter promotion standards be reinstituted in order to guarantee academic

achievement.

A concept in the educational system known as mass promotion, also referred to as

social promotion, permits, whenever possible, the automatic promotion of all students to the

following grade level (To retain or promote: Asking the right question, 2014). This concept

emerged in the Philippines as a result of DepEd's clear efforts to lower student retention rates

to zero and raise student promotion rates in public schools by issuing the aforementioned

DepEd instructions.

Around the world, the issue of whether it is better to retain low-performing students in

their grade level or to promote them along with their age-mates has been both hotly disputed

and heavily studied issues for decades (Thompson & Cunningham, 2000). Advocates of

retention have maintained that:

“…it sends a message to all students that weak effort and poor performance will not

be tolerated, and that it gives lagging students an opportunity to get serious and get

ready for the next grade. It is often euphemistically called ‘a year to grow’, holding

back, non-promotion, and a gift of time. Its goal is to improve school performance by

allowing more time for students to develop adequate academic skills (Wynn, 2010).”

However, a number of studies had negative results regarding retention. They asserted

that promotion enables students the chance to advance through the following year's

curriculum, while retention causes students to repeat material and fall further behind their

peers who are making progress. They also claimed that retention demeans students whose

motivation and confidence are already low (Jackson, 1975). According to Roderick (1995),

who referenced Holmes and Matthews for their quantitative investigation, retention had

inconsistently negative but only mild effects on measured self-esteem and school affiliation.
This indicates that retention slightly diminishes kids' feelings of self-worth and school

commitment, which increases the likelihood of absenteeism and dropouts (Roderick, 1995).

According to Wynn's (2010) study, grade retention appears to be the primary tactic

employed as a temporary fix for pupils who do not meet the requirements to advance to the

following grade. The consequences of grade retention are obvious, and its academic

advantages are fleeting and expensive (Holmes, 1989); (Hauser, 2009). There is no proof to

support claims that new retention rules will be accompanied with successful learning deficit

rehabilitation that would justify their expense or counteract the retention's well-established

long-term detrimental impacts (Hauser, 2009). If the student had been promoted, would he

have learnt as much? That is the ultimate question. Nobody would argue that schools should

permit students to move through the system without learning, especially those kids who lack

the basic literacy and numeracy abilities. However, there is a great deal of dispute regarding

how to handle the issue of insufficient mastery of grade level criteria. In order to address the

child who is deemed unprepared to move on to the following grade, one finds a variety of

school policies and retention strategies.

These justifications provide a solid foundation for the idea of mass promotion (To

retain or promote: Asking the right question, 2014). The Philippine Department of Education

requires teachers to come up with strategies for ensuring that every child achieves academic

success and that they do so before assigning a failing grade. Some suggested strategies to aid

difficult pupils include tutoring, remediation, mentoring, small group work, after-school

programs, Saturday school, and summer school (Luistro, 2015; Valisno, 2010).

With regard to the aforementioned DepEd orders and the mass promotion of students

as a whole, the present study seeks to have a rich description and knowledge of instructors'

perspectives on how this program or order affects the Philippines educational system and
students learning. This idea was developed since there isn't much research that examines

mass promotion; a bane or boon.

Statement of the Problem

The study assessed the awareness and implementation of the DepEd’s mass

promotion among the elementary school teachers of Central Schools in Poblacion, Abuyog

Leyte.

Specifically, this study sought to answer the following questions:

1. What is the perceived attitude of teachers on the mass promotion of the

elementary pupils?

2. What are the challenges encountered on DepEd’s mass promotion?

3. What are the lived experiences of teachers on DepEd’s mass promotion?

Significance of the Study

Mass promotion is practiced as an intervention so that no learner would be left behind

academically. Parallel to this, mass promotion has a great impact on our society, on our

pupils, parents and guardians.

Scope and Limitations of the Study

The study assessed the awareness and implementation on mass promotion among the

elementary teachers of Central Schools in Abuyog Leyte. This study looked into the

perceived attitude of teachers on mass promotion of the elementary pupils, the challenges

encountered and the lived experienced of teachers on DepEd’s mass promotion.

 The respondents of the study were the elementary teachers of Central Schools in

Abuyog Leyte. The study has been conducted during the School Year 2021-2022.

Theoretical Framework

Teachers must be familiar with a student’s learning processes. Not taken into

consideration is that there are other factors that influence student performance. A very

important one is the student’s inherent abilities and intelligence. This can be explained

through Novak and Gowin‘s (1984) theoretical framework for education, Learning How to

Learn.

“If I had to reduce all the educational psychology to just one principle, I would say

this: The most important single factor influencing learning is what the learner

already knows” (Ausubel, Novak & Hanesian,1978, p. 163).

The focus of this research includes combining the No Child Left Behind policy and the

above theoretical framework of Novak and Gowin. Teaching is the achievement of shared

meaning. To empower teachers and students is one of the most important points to

achievement in learning (Gowin, 1981).

METHODOLOGY

This study’s purpose is aligned to a qualitative study within the interpretative

paradigm which aims to:

“…make sense of, or interpret phenomena in terms of the meaning that people bring

to them” (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008, p. 4).

 A case study design which is a systematic and in-depth investigation of a particular

instance in its context (Yin, 2009) was used to provide a rich description of teachers’

experiences and perceptions on mass promotion.

Related Studies and Literature

Mass Promotion is the policy of promoting students to the next grade, next semester,

and next level irrespective of their performance in academics as well as practical. It is given

in a uniform manner to all the students. (Satish Singh

Manhas-https://www.dailyexcelsior.com/impact-of-mass-promotion-on-quality-education/)

Automatic promotion is a widespread and controversial educational practice both in

developed and developing countries. Dictionary of Education (2000) defines automatic

promotion as “the practice in primary and secondary schooling of advancing pupils from one

grade to the next higher grade at the end of the school year regardless of the educational

attainment of the pupils” (Mehndiratta, 2000, p.38)

Prospero de Vera, Chair of the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd), noted that

mass promotion could result in academic problems, especially when there is lack of

requirements or basis for the students’ grades. Mass promotion in universities may be

disadvantageous for students in need of numeric grades, such as those maintaining

scholarships or aspiring for Latin honors.

References

Gowin, D. (1981). Educating. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Hauser, R. (2009, July 4). What if we ended social promotion? Retrieved from Education

Week on the Web: http://www.edweek.org/ew/vol-18/30hauser

Luistro, A. A. (2015). Policy guidelines on classroom assessment for the K to 12 basic

education program. Pasig City: Department of Education.

Mehndiratta, M. ( 2000). Dictionary of Education. KS Paperbacks, New Delhi.

Roderick, M. (1995). Grade retention and school dropout: Policy debate and research

questions. Phi Delta Kappa Research Bulletin, 1-8.

Valisno, M. D. (2010). Guidelines on mainstreaming the dropout reduction program

(DORP) in the public secondary schools. Pasig City: Department of Education.

Yin, R. (2009). Case study Research: Design and Methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Publications.