26/08/2026
๐จ๐ป๐ถ๐๐ ๐ฆ๐๐ฎ๐๐ฒ๐บ๐ฒ๐ป๐ ๐ผ๐ป ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฃ๐ฟ๐ผ๐ฝ๐ผ๐๐ฒ๐ฑ ๐๐ต๐ฎ๐ป๐ด๐ฒ๐ ๐๐ผ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐๐ฒ๐ป๐ฒ๐ฟ๐ฎ๐น ๐๐ฑ๐๐ฐ๐ฎ๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป (๐๐) ๐๐๐ฟ๐ฟ๐ถ๐ฐ๐๐น๐๐บ
We, the undersigned education students organizations and councils, reject the Commission on Higher Educationโs (CHED) proposed changes to the General Education (GE) Curriculum. Under the new GE Curriculum, the number of general education (GE) units taken during college will be cut from thirty-six to eighteen units, to reduce redundancy between subjects taken at the basic and tertiary levels and to better prepare students for life after graduation and meet the current demands of the job market.
A holistic approach to education must not view its students solely as future employees. A holistic education must seek to empower students to be lifelong learners by providing them with a learning environment that is free, accessible, high-quality, and safe.
The Flawed Logic of Reducing Units
CHED rationalizes its newly proposed GE curriculum by arguing that subjects will not truly be lost, but simply transformed. The Commission seeks to do this in two ways. First, by turning collegiate-level subjectsโsuch as Art Appreciation and Mathematicsโinto senior high school core subjects. Second, by marrying two disciplines together, as seen in the case of Science, Technology, and Society, and Ethics, which CHED proposes to combine into Data, Evidence, and Ethics.
There are several issues with these two approaches. First, collapsing separate disciplines into a single subject risks diluting the subject matters into fractured, hollow curricula. Instead of students being able to fully learn and appreciate modern science and ethics over the course of their college journey for example, they will now be forced to absorb two separate disciplines within a single course, taken over the duration of one semester. Moreover, the disciplinesโ content will not be holistic. They will be severely reduced, rehashed, and therefore splintered to fit this one-semester, one-course rule.
Furthermore, turning college-level subjects into senior high school core subjects places the burden on basic education instructors to suddenly adapt and learn curricula that CHED does not equip them to teach. This burden is entirely avoidable, given that higher education institutions (HEIs) already have capable professors who have the capacity to teach these GE courses. Hence, CHED should seriously reevaluate its position as burdening basic educational teachers in this way is extremely impractical and difficult.
Removing Arts and History
We argue that one of the most glaring issues with the proposed GE Curriculum is its complete removal of the Art Appreciation course at the collegiate level. The arts and humanities help learners make sense of the world around them. It encourages students to critique power imbalances, political systems, and inequalities. Thus, the absence of these in our GE curriculum will create learners who are not equipped with the proper tools to critically analyze the world around them.
While it is commendable that CHED acknowledged the need for further digital and labor rights literacy, we argue that technological advancement must also go hand in hand with advances in the arts. There is no reason for CHED to deem that one is more valuable than the other, since both are needed for a holistic education.
Creating Cheap Laborers, Not Lifelong Learners
It is deplorable that CHED is tailoring our education to fit the interests and values of big business owners. Instead of cultivating spaces for learning and curiosity to thrive, we are being prepared to create profit for companies that will not pay us livable wages. We are being prepared to become employees for big businesses that do not and will never value the entirety of our labor and humanity.
Furthermore, there has been no co-determination with key stakeholder groups, such as students and professors of HEIs. CHED has not learned its lesson after strong-arming the removal of Filipino and Panitikan subjects at the tertiary level in 2019. The Commission shamelessly continues the same practice and process of mandating policies that will ultimately harm tertiary education in the short and long term.
Displacement of Teachers and Job Mismatch
Reduction of GE units would substantially decrease the demands for instructors teaching social sciences, arts, humanities, and related subjects. Many instructors would lose teaching units, or be forced to take on subjects far from their discipline. CHED only proposes the reduction of units, but no safeguards for teachers who will be affected by the changes in the GE curriculum.
Although CHED deferred the implementation of the proposed changes of GE curriculum to 2028, two Filipino instructors from Bulacan State University - Sarmiento have already lost their jobs over the proposal. They stood up for their colleagues who are bound to lose Filipino teaching units should the changes to the GE curriculum be implemented.
Moving Forward
We are in an education crisis that demands urgent attention and action. Rather than implementing reforms that risk displacement of teachers and further decline of the quality of education, CHED should prioritize addressing the fundamental challenges faced by the education sector, including learning gaps, inadequate funding, teacher welfare, and unequal access to quality education.
CHED must serve as a liberating institution that empowers educators, students, and the academic community, not as an oppressive apparatus that advances the interests of big businesses, exploiting and making money off us.
Signatories:
Future Educators for Upliftment and Progress (FED UP)
TEACHER EDUCATION CIRCLE - COLLEGE OF EDUCATION, CAVITE STATE UNIVERSITY - MAIN CAMPUS
The PNU Writers Circle
KADIPAN PNU-Manila
PNU Students and Educators for ASEAN
Philippine Normal University Club for UNESCO (PNU Club for UNESCO)
PNU NAMI
Hiraya Kolektib Bulacan State University
College of Education Student Council Cavite State University Don Severino de las Alas Campus
PNU - USC Student Gender and Development Commission
PNU Pet Advocacy and Welfare Society
PNU Katalonan
