Wednesday, January 17, 2007 Schools fail to produce 'men with conscience' By Jane Cadalig
WHILE globalization may have opened avenues to uplift people's lives, it has also caused economic and social adversities, including morals degradation, said a former legislator.
Former Benguet congressman Andres Cosalan used the aborted Charter change to explain the supposed loss of values among the country's political leaders and to reflect the failure of schools to produce "men with conscience" due to globalization.
In his speech during the opening program of the Benguet State University (BSU) 21st Charter Day celebration, Cosalan said globalization has wiped out the nobler purpose of education, saying this has brought about the need to merely educate to meet the demands in the jobs market.
"Globalization has made education and learning market-oriented - to teach and train to produce marketable know-how and skills among the students to enable them to compete in the job market," he said.
But this, Cosalan said, contributed to the degradation of values formation among the youth, which, he emphasized, has been clearly demonstrated by members of Congress when they pushed for the amendment of the Constitution without due regard to the Senate.
"The people's outrage over the proposal to amend the Constitution by a Constituent Assembly without the Senate arose, not from the proposal itself, but from self-serving, shameless, and immoral amendment of their own rules to accomplish their legally questionable purpose of forming a Constituent Assembly of their own without the Senate," he added.
"Adding fuel to the anger of the people is the brazen and self-serving attempt of the majority of (Congress members) to include an amendment to the Constitution to scrap the 2007 elections so they can extend their terms for seven months and indefinitely after that period because only them can schedule the next election after they constitute themselves as a unicameral parliament," said Cosalan, who was the province's lone representative from 1965 to 1972 and 1978 to 1984.
While saying that universities, like the BSU, should learn to face the material challenges of globalization, these institutions should not also neglect inculcating values to students.
He said values formation should be an indispensable part of the universities' educational thrusts, more important than the production of marketable skills.
This as the former congressman said educational institutions and the religious sectors are the ones answerable to the degradation of the morals of today's leaders.
"Where lies the failure to inculcate common decency and moral character among many of the country's leaders today - our educational institutions or the church and religious guardians of our morals? I daresay that the failure lies with and is attributable to both, because our educational and religious institutions both carry the responsibility of molding the character of our youth," Cosalan said.
