SENATE Committee on Basic Education chairman Sherwin Gatchalian described the slot allocations of the Educational Service Contracting or ESC for non-poor households as the height of injustice.

The senator’s office analyzed data from the Annual Poverty Indicators Survey or APIS 2020 and 2022 and found that for the School Year 2020-2021, 68% of ESC recipients were from non-poor households or those whose incomes are above or equal to the per capita threshold.

For School Year 2019-2020, 59% were from non-poor households.

The ESC is a partnership program of the Department of Education that seeks to decongest overcrowded public junior high schools.

Under the program, the government shoulders the tuition and other fees of excess students in public schools who enter private schools contracted by the DepEd.

Gatchalian added that these figures reflect the findings of the Commission on Audit in 2018.

In a Performance Audit Report, state auditors recommended that the DepEd should ensure that Government Assistance to Students and Teachers in Private Education prioritizes underprivileged learners.

Based on higher-end estimates from the senator’s office, the leakage from the ESC program is worth P8.6 billion.

“To me this is the height of injustice. Humihingi tayo ng pondo, binibigay natin sa hindi mahihirap. And as taxpayers, we’re subsidizing the non-poor,” said Gatchalian.

“The spirit of the law is already giving priority to the poorest of the poor. And I think it’s embedded in all of us. We all know that resources are scarce, we all know that during budget season, we fight for resources, and from the meager resources that we get, the allocation should be prioritizing the poor,” Gatchalian said.