The Commission on Higher Education (CHED) assured that the K to 12 Program will continue despite the discontinuance of the Senior High School (SHS) Program in government-run higher education institutions (HEIs).
CHED pointed out that the K to 12 transition period ended in 2021, thus, there is “no longer legal basis” for SUCs and LUCs to continue offering the SHS Program.
Some public HEIs have stopped offering the SHS program as early as 2019, CHED said.
K to 12 Program ‘not abolished’ despite removal of SHS in public universities, colleges --- CHED
Jan 8, 2024 06:06 AM
At a glance
While many government-run higher education institutions (HEIs) have stopped offering the Senior High School (SHS) Program, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) on Monday, Jan. 8, clarified that the K to 12 Program will continue.
“The K to 12 Program is not abolished,” CHED Chairman Popoy De Vera said in a press conference.
De Vera clarified concerns on the continuity of the K to 12 Program after CHED confirmed that many State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) and Local Universities and Colleges (LUCs) have removed the SHS Program from their offerings.
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https://mb.com.ph/2024/1/2/ched-confirms-discontinuation-of-shs-program-in-su-cs-lu-cs
“It's not within the power of the commission to abolish the K to 12 program,” De Vera said. “It is a law enacted by Congress and the K to 12 will continue pursuant to the Republic Act that that created it…let’s make that clear,” he added.
Transition period over
De Vera explained that public universities and tertiary institutions got involved in SHS due to the need for additional resources during the K to 12 transition period.
“During the transition period, the capacity of DepEd was limited, you needed time to build useful buildings, to hire faculty members,” he explained. “The decision was to get the help of public and private universities to accept SHS students,” he added.
However, he pointed out that the transition period ended in 2021. Thus, there is “no longer legal basis” for SUCs and LUCs to continue offering the SHS Program.
“There may be no legal basis anymore to provide vouchers because the transition period is over and therefore, if SUCs accept students from Senior High, how will they pay for their education?” De Vera asked.
He explained that in private universities, “there is a law that allows for funding students enrolled in private universities but in public universities, the governing law is the transition period law.”
With the transition period over, SUCs and LUCs offering the SHS program can no longer receive vouchers from the government through the Department of Education (DepEd). “They were getting vouchers from DepEd to pay for the education of their students in SHS but that was for the transition period,” De Vera said.
He pointed out that by law, public universities "cannot charge tuition and miscellaneous fees" because these are being subsidized by the national government. “So if they accept Senior High School students, where will they get the cost of educating these Senior High School students?” he added.
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Not a ‘permanent solution’
De Vera explained that the authority of the public universities to have a high school is governed by the K to 12 transition period. “It was not supposed to be a permanent solution… they were going to help with the Senior High during the transition period only,” he added.
Accepting SHS students in SUCs and LUCs, De Vera said, was based on the premise that there were “not enough” facilities by DepEd in the area.
“The reason why we accepted the challenge, on the part of the higher education sector, is because of the problem of the period of transition,” he explained.
“The transition period was supposed to be a transitional period only, it was not meant to be a permanent solution,” he added.
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