The Philippines Save the Children in the Philippines Save the Children has worked for underserved children in the Philippines for 26 years. From its initial program in West Visayas, which began in 1982, the Philippines Country Office has expanded and now implements child-focused education, health and emergency preparedness and response programs in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao, the archipelago’s three major island groups. Save the Children has a special focus of helping children made vulnerable by endemic poverty, natural disasters or by armed conflict. Programs are marked by the active involvement of families and communities, so that progress made for children can be sustained. Challenges for Children Access to and quality of basic services in education and health are major challenges for children in the Philippines. With eight of 10 children unable to access early childhood services, many Filipino first-graders enter school without the skills they need to learn. In Metro Manila, overcrowded schools result in teachers holding classes in two or three shifts a day. In contrast, rural schools have fewer students but suffer from a lack of basic resources, such as books, teaching supplies, or even teachers. The public education system’s inability to catch up with rapid growth in the student population has led to a serious decline in the quality of instruction and student achievement. An alarming number of very young children in the Philippines have iron deficiency anemia. Among older children, this is compounded by soil-transmitted parasitic worms that cause malnutrition and diseases – a result of poor sanitation and hygiene. In Mindanao, children and their families are vulnerable to the effects of sporadic conflict between various armed groups and the Philippine military. Numbers at a Glance The population of the Philippines is 91 million. One in three children under age 5 are underweight; among school children, one in five are underweight. Only one in five children, ages 3-5, have access to day care or preschool services. On average, only 43 percent of the required English, Science and Math competencies are mastered by Filipino students. The infant mortality rate is 22 per 1,000 births. Our Response Education: Save the Children’s programs span children’s developmental stages from early childhood development to basic education to adolescent learning.  Early childhood programs include the Early Steps to School Success project, which provides a continuum of health, psychosocial care and early learning services for children from birth to age 8. Basic education programs enhance children’s learning experiences through school and classroom improvements, teacher training, after-school programs, and support for school, home and community reading. Adolescent learning programs provide alternative options for children who have dropped out of school, as well as livelihood and job programs that develop out-of-school youths’ employability skills. School Feeding Program. Photo by Michael Bisceglie Health: Save the Children provides school-based health and nutrition services, behavior-centered education and training, and school improvements. We also focus on reproductive health and HIV prevention, provide de-worming medicine and vitamin A and iron supplements to vulnerable children suffering from soil-transmitted parasites and iron deficiency anemia. Sustainable health improvements through our Empowerment and Local Development project improve families’ access to quality health services in remote and difficult-to-reach areas in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. Through the Advocacy for Improved Maternal and Child Health project, advocacy for maternal and child health issues as well as family planning are being brought to the fore at local and regional levels. Emergency Response: Save the Children provides water, sanitation services, food and essential items to displaced children and their families in the conflict-affected area of Mindanao. We have organized 37 local nongovernment organizations in Mindanao into a network whose members implement and coordinate relief operations, rehabilitation and humanitarian activities. Our Disaster Preparedness and Response program supports the survival and recovery of children made extremely vulnerable by disasters such as the recent typhoons and floods. Sponsorship: Through our sponsorship programs, Save the Children implements child-focused health and education programs in disadvantaged communities in two cities in Metro Manila and nine municipalities in the Western Visayas Provinces of Iloilo and Antique. Since 2007, the sponsorship program has been working in three municipalities in South Central Mindanao, where Save the Children aims to reach a greater number of children in need. Plans for the Future Save the Children will continue to improve innovative child-focused programs from early childhood to adolescence. Examples include a neighborhood-based early childhood education project, our home-based and community-based reading remediation program, a comprehensive package of school-based interventions for improving children’s health and life skills-based peer education for adolescents. These and other child-focused programs will be expanded to broaden the reach and increase the number of children benefiting from Save the Children programs. Learning Life Skills in the Philippines Only 67 out of 100 children who enter the first grade will complete the sixth grade; only 45 out of 64 high schoolers will complete the 10th grade. Dropping out of school in adolescence as a result of poverty is further complicated by engagement in risky behaviors like gambling, drugs, smoking and drinking.  Errol, an adolescent who didn't see the importance of school, skipped classes with friends. After participating in Save the Children's FREE (Friends Reaching Out to Each Other) sessions, he felt compelled to make a significant change to his life. "I realized I have many good assets to be proud of. I learned life skills, like critical thinking, problem-solving and effective communication, to handle challenging situations. I put dedication into my studies, no longer engage in vices, am selective in choosing friends and supportive to my family. My longing is to share with other youth my learning and influence them for the better." Errol’s story represents the most common problem among adolescents in the Philippines, engaging in risky behaviors. Behavior change is very difficult to accomplish. To support Errol and his siblings, his mother attended a Save the Children parenting education session and learned effective parenting skills.