TESDA as full-fledged department?

After years of being bounced across departments and loaded with new mandates, the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) may be headed for a major upgrade as a congressional body says proposals to make it a full-fledged department “merit serious consideration.”

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Trainings may be conducted by technical vocational institutions and TESDA technology institutions subject to compliance with TESDA guidelines and public health standards. TESDA FB PAGE

The Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM II) expressed openness to the idea in its more than 600-page final report submitted to Congress this week, a sweeping review that traces long-running failures across the education sector and lays out proposed fixes.

In the case of TESDA, the commission said the agency’s current setup — where it simultaneously regulates, delivers, and assesses technical-vocational training — creates “fundamental conflicts of interest” that weaken oversight and distort the training market.

Addressing those conflicts, the report said, would require fixes to how it operates, starting with its current form as an attached agency of the Department of Labor and Employment.

EDCOM II said one proposal is to elevate TESDA into a full-fledged department with a redesigned governance structure, a move the commission said “merits serious consideration” given the scale of the agency’s structural problems.

The idea, raised by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) Education Task Force during stakeholder consultations, is aimed at untangling TESDA’s overlapping roles as regulator, training provider, and assessor.