Providing evidence-based recommendations to improve Philippine education

IDinsight partners with the Second Congressional Commission on Education in the Philippines (EDCOM 2) to tackle urgent education challenges. This multi-phase learning partnership equips policymakers with actionable, data-driven insights to guide meaningful reforms that improve education outcomes for Filipino students.

Decision-maker’s challenge

Filipino children face a severe learning crisis, with low early childhood education support, poor learning outcomes and high learning poverty in basic education, and a higher education system struggling to instill the 21st century skills needed in today’s global economy.

To address these challenges, EDCOM 2 was established to assess the country’s education system and recommend reforms to its quality and effectiveness. EDCOM 2 is set to work for three years, starting from 2023 to 2025, during which the Commission will conduct a thorough assessment of the Philippine education system, propose necessary reforms, and provide recommendations for legislative and policy changes to improve the quality of education in the country. This will also include conducting comprehensive studies and hosting consultations with various education stakeholders before submitting final recommendations in 2025.

Impact opportunity

EDCOM 2 presents a unique opportunity for policy reforms, bringing together Congress, national government agencies, researchers, and civil society organizations to address priority areas in education. The three-year window of EDCOM 2 will enable the country to fill key gaps in the education sector and improve learning environments and outcomes for millions of Filipinos. 

In order to do so, EDCOM 2 needs reliable data and evidence around the current state of education and what evidence-based best practices can be adopted to push the sector forward. Through our learning partnership, IDinsight aims to provide data- and evidence-based recommendations around priority reform areas to maximize the Commission’s impact during its three-year tenure.

Our approach

Our research is uniquely driven by urgent policy windows, aligned with the potential long-term impact on the future of Philippine education. By embedding our demand-driven, agile approach within EDCOM 2 and DepEd’s key policy and decision-making processes, we aim to deliver high-quality, actionable data under tight policy timelines. This partnership ensures that each insight contributes directly to shaping policies that will improve education outcomes for generations to come.

To date, our partnership has focused on:

Phase 1: Opportunities to Address Undernutrition in the Early Years

As many as one in three Filipino children are stunted, which has significant implications for the country’s human capital development. In order for children to perform their best in school, they need a foundation of healthy, diverse, and sufficient diets. To identify gaps in current government nutrition interventions, IDinsight conducted a review of current coverage in the country’s varied nutrition programs targeting children aged zero through primary school, and assessed those against international best practices. 

Phase 2: Understanding Teacher Workload to Inform School Structure and Staffing

Many public school school teachers have reported unsustainable workloads and high levels of burnout, attributed to the plethora of non-teaching tasks often assigned to them and diversity of learners they must accommodate in the classroom. In an attempt to reduce teacher workload and burnout, the Department of Education (DepEd) has initiated policy reforms to offload all administrative work from teachers and initiated hiring of over 19,000 Administrative Officer II (AO2) positions to assist schools with routine administrative tasks. To assess the current state of teacher workload in this shifting policy context, IDinsight conducted a mixed-methods study of teacher workload to better understand how teachers are spending their time, what roles these new AO2s are serving, and what implications remain for future staffing within government-run public schools.

Phase 3: Assessing the Early Stage Implementation of the Inclusive Education Act

In 2022, the Philippines signed the Inclusive Education Act, landmark legislation that aims to strengthen inclusive education access and practices nationwide, particularly for learners with disabilities. However, the implementation of the Act is still in its early stages with many of the promised services and resources remaining undelivered. IDinsight conducted a mixed-methods study to assess the readiness of schools and resource centers to adopt these new inclusive education reforms and identify the challenges they face in the process. The study included a nationwide survey of 1,994 teachers, supplemented with qualitative interviews of teachers, supervisors, and special education experts.

Phase 1 results

Opportunities to Address Undernutrition in the Early Years

Summary findings, outlined in our policy brief and op-ed, include:

• Current prevalence rates for under-5 stunting, wasting, and underweight stand at 26.7%, 5.5%, and 15% are born with low birth weight. The Philippines performs worse on stunting and low birth weight than many regional peers and low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) with comparable gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, such as Nepal, Cambodia, and Senegal.
• Nutrition-specific programming for children under 5 years of age in the Philippines adheres to globally recommended evidence-based nutrition interventions and outcome targets through programs such as the Kalusugan at Nutrisyon ng Mag-Nanay Act, Tutok Kainan, and Micronutrient Supplementation Program, but challenges in implementation prevent adequate program coverage and impact.
• Compared to other LMICs, the Philippines performs well in breastfeeding counseling, micronutrient powder intake, and treating diarrhea, but falls short on the prevalence of breastfeeding, use of iron folic acid (IFA) by pregnant women, and consumption of iodized salt.
• Nutrition programs in the Philippines rely on the coordinated work of local government units (LGUs), municipal bodies, and barangay health teams, but these programs face challenges in local-level implementation due to staffing constraints, resource limitations, knowledge gaps, commitment and advocacy issues, and a lack of monitoring data, along with legal and policy inconsistencies.
• Recommendations include improving coverage and delivery of micronutrient supplementation, increasing coverage for management of severe and acute malnutrition, researching barriers to breastfeeding, strengthening implementation of nutrition-sensitive interventions, and broader sectoral investments to support a holistic approach to child nutrition.

These findings helped secure an additional 300 million PHP (~$5.4 million) from Congress to support ‘first 1,000 days of life’ (F1KD) nutrition interventions, prioritizing the poorest municipalities. The results also sparked high-level policy discussions around integrated nutrition budgeting across national government agencies to address gaps in coverage and implementation, enhance costing, and improve budget and expenditure tracking.