A survey of the educational system of the Philippine islands by the Board of educational survey, created under acts 3162 and 3196 of the Philippine Legislature.

192 EDUCATIONAL SURVEY OF THE PHILIPPINES

curriculum. Tentative norms should then be established at the level
of attainment actually reached by the best schools.
It is clear, therefore, that a definite beginning can be made now in
the placing of goals of educational attainment before the teachers and
pupils. These tentative goals should be the best practices now attained
by several school systems, not the median achievement of the schools.
The median achievement is always too low. Half of the schools
are below it. Really, to leaven the work of the schools, relatively high
standards should be set.
One criterion for the setting of norms, therefore, is: What is the best
practice attainable under present conditions? In this discussion the
assumption has been made that the problem of the relative values of
the materials of the curriculum-reading, language, number work, social
and physical sciences, manual arts, and the like-will be solved in
connection with the reconstruction of the curriculum. Standards of
attainment in the various departments can be established only after an
answer has been given to the basic question: What knowledge is of
most worth?
The Academic Division of the Central Bureau Should Be Reorganized
To Exert Real Leadership in Research and Experimentation
Repeatedly in this survey, inefficiency in the work of the schools
has been traced back to the lack of real educational leadership in the
Academic Division of the central bureau. The work of research and
experimentation on the problems of Philippine education should have
been developed during the past years. The Commission has discovered
no examples of real research and experimentation which have been
carried on by the academic division. Only within the past year have
facilities been provided there for measuring the work of the schools.
One trained person was appointed in July, 1924. The only assistance
given him, however, was a stenographer.
Five Important Lines of Work Should Be Carried on in the
Academic Division
The Commission is of the belief that in the Academic Division should
focus the carrying on of five very important lines of work: First, the
continuous construction and reconstruction of the curriculum, carried
on by real research methods to fit the curriculum intimately to Philippine
economic, social, and political conditions; second, the systematic and
periodic measuring of the work of the schools, the setting of standards
and the guidance of the schools in their use; third, experimental trial of
alternative methods of teaching, types of curriculum material, and the
like; fourth, the training of teachers; fifth, the stimulation of adminis