Business education still a popular course –CHED

Thursday 19th of April 2012

ILOILO CITY, April 19 (PIA) -- Business Education has been and will be a preferred course among college enrollees in Western Visayas, the Commission on Higher Education-6 (CHED6) said.

The CHED-6 enrollment profile of higher educational institutions (HEIs) for school year 2011-2012 showed that Business Education topped the ranking of disciplines with 72 percent followed by Teacher Education, 14.2 percent; Information Technology, 13.9 percent; Maritime Education, 11.8 percent; Medical Related , 9.4 percent; Law and Criminology, 6.0 percent; Engineering, 5.8 percent; Arts and Sciences, 4.1; Industrial Technology, 3 percent; and Agriculture, 2.5 percent.

CHED-6 Chief Education Program Specialist Dr. Rex C. Casiple said popular programs under Business Education include BS in Business Administration or BS in Commerce, BS in Hotel and Restaurant Management, BS in Tourism, BS in Hospitality Management, BS in Accountancy, BS in Accounting Technology, BS Office Administration and BS Custom Administration.

Programs in Teacher Education are Bachelor of Elementary Education and Bachelor of Secondary Education; while for Information Technology, there are the BS in Information Technology, BS in Information System and BS in Computer Science.

Casiple said those in Maritime Education include BS in Marine Engineering and BS in Marine Transportation, while Medical-related discipline has BS in Nursing, BS in Medical Technology, BS in Radiologic Technology, Midwifery, Doctor of Medicine and BS in Pharmacy.

He said that popular programs under the Engineering discipline are BS in Mechanical Engineering, BS in Civil Engineering, BS in Electrical Engineering, BS in Electronics and Communications Engineering, BS in Chemical Engineering and BS in Computer Engineering.

On the other hand, Casiple said, it is also projected that Business Education may still top as to the number of graduates this school year 2011-2012.

Last school year, business education ranked number one, getting 27.5 percent of the share of graduates. It is followed by medical-related courses, with 19.5 percent, teacher education with 12.96 percent, and information technology, 12.6 percent.

Casiple said the eight percent lead of business education over the medical-related discipline and the 14 percent lead over the teacher education are more than enough to support the projection.

“This is also considering that the number of BS Nursing graduates, representing about 75 percent of the graduates in Medical Related discipline continues to decrease annually at an average of at least 10 percent,” Casiple said.

Meanwhile, Casiple said it is sad to note that in a developing country, like the Philippines, engineering education is ranking low as to the number of graduates, yielding only about 3.7 percent.

“Engineers are considered ‘builders of the nation’ and play important role in the development of this country,” Casiple, a Mechanical Engineering graduate, said.

As adviser of the Philippine Society of Mechanical Engineers-Panay Chapter, Casiple said they have been advocating strongly, for the past three years, to increase enrollment in Engineering Education.

“We are asking government for the full implementation of Republic Act 8495, or the Philippine Mechanical Engineering Law of 1998,” he said. (CHED-6/JSC/ESS-PIA6 Iloilo)