THE Second Congressional Commission on Education urged the Department of Education to further review the minimum service standards to enable teachers to adopt learner-centered and inquiry-based approaches.

EDCOM 2 Executive Director Dr. Karol Mark Yee raised questions regarding the need to review these standards.

“For instance, what are the needs of schools implementing special curricular programs, like science elementary and secondary schools, in addition to the usual operating costs of public schools? What minimum service standards would support and foster learning as envisioned in recent curricular reforms?” he said.

The Commission’s recommendation followed a proposal by the Asian Development Bank for a new normative formula based on the minimum amount of Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses needed by a school to comply with the Department’s current service standards.

In coordination with the Department of Budget and Management, DepEd adopted a modified version of the ADB formula, resulting in a 32% overall increase in the School MOOE allocation in the 2025 National Expenditure Program.

In a separate forum held by the Commission with the ADB and DBM on October 21, DBM committed to implementing the full formula in FY 2026.

This change is expected to yield an estimated 85% increase in the overall School MOOE budget.

Historically, the Boncodin formula determined MOOE budgets based on fixed costs and variable factors, including enrollment size, number of teachers, number of graduating students, and classroom count.

While DepEd has adjusted the coefficients over the years to account for inflation, limited documentation has made it difficult for the agency to justify proposed budget increases based on the Boncodin formula.

As part of its technical assistance to DepEd, the ADB conducted a study reviewing the Boncodin formula.

The ADB found that the Boncodin formula is biased against schools with high student-to-classroom or student-to-teacher ratios.

This bias results in lower School MOOE per student, exacerbating resource challenges in congested schools.