The Republic act 9163 indicates that every tertiary level student is required to comply with the NSTP program as implied on the school curricula. This law declares that every citizen has the responsibility to defend the state, and this can be done by rendering personal, civil or military service. Because of this, RA 9163 or more known as the National Training Service Program provides three basic line up that offers an elective choice for the students, and these are the following: ROTC/CMT (Reserve Officers Training Course/Civil Military Training), CWTS (Civic Welfare Training service), and the LTS (Literacy Training Service).[1] These three courses are offered in Adamson University, and a great deal of difference to the number of enrollees can be observed from this. It has a lot of said reasons for their choice that it explains why the number of enrollees for the three courses is lopsided.
On the first semester of the Academic Year 2010-2011 a huge amount of freshmen students including the late takers of the NSTP program, enrolled in any of the three courses. There were 2,025 enrollees for CWTS, 870 Enrollees for LTS, and 746 enrollees for ROTC.[2] From their number of enrollees it is clearly evident that the most popular choice for the NSTP program is CWTS, while the most unpopular is ROTC. As an ROTC officer since 2008, I personally observed that this has already made a great deal of improvement for the ROTC program reaching 746 enrollees for that semester, because for the last two academic years (2008-2009; 2009-2010), the ROTC program only manages to reach to an estimate of 300 cadets including the exempted varsity players, Band members, Pep Squad, and Adamson drummers, declining its number to as low as 250 cadets and cadettes, while CWTS and LTS are having a hard time trying to accommodate an estimate of 4000 enrollees combined.
In the past, ROTC was charged with allegations that have been proved, and therefore caused the abolition of the mandatory ROTC. There were factors that negatively talks about ROTC, and because of this stereotypes, no matter how the cadet officers, training staff and school administration specifically the OSA tries to promote ROTC, it will always end up in a strong and though decision that ROTC is exhausting, tiring, scary, something that extorts and a world of hazer’s. They can not be blamed for the News Media plays a role in this subject, and as we remember, it is usually the negative side that is shown. Like the death of a Thomasian student from the hands of ROTC officers, and the existence of the base of Student Intelligence Network (SIN).[3]
However, there are still yet to be proven. Only a few becomes optimistic and choose not to believe this allegations, and only that with high hopes of being in the military decides to join ROTC. What these students refuse to know is that ROTC is now improving and changing its bad habits, as we adhere to the anti-hazing law; have an inclusive attendance system; Offer different units like Medics and comprehensive that is exclusive for classroom instructions only, and the choice of unit lies within the cadets/cadettes; and for the avoidance of false accusations of extortion we render the payments for ROTC expenses to the Adamson offices.
Aside from the reasons for this numbers, it is seen that we were right when we proved that the change in our training day from Sunday to Saturday has lifted the number of enrollees. Yet, this is still not enough to make the number of enrollees reach to its peak. Lately the second semester of the Academic year 2010-2011 the enrollees had a mass declination of numbers in the part of all the three courses. The CWTS went down to 1772 enrollees; LTS have 691 enrollees, while ROTC still at the bottom with 405 enrollees. This now involves the general enrollees of students in Adamson and general reasons. Due to the new grading system, students flee to another schools; also the Conflict of students with schedules were observable; the newly irregular first year students had some adjusting to do, and the shifting of NSTP courses was rampant.
Consequently, it is believed that the Government becomes incapable of producing capable reservists, whereas recently a new proposal was made by Rep. Erico Aumentado in bringing back the mandatory ROTC back to colleges and universities for the reason that it is said that the policy of the state requires citizens to render civil, military, and personal services. And compared to regular citizens, reservists is the most organized and prepared when it comes to rendering immediate services at any time in any place.[4]
In my own educated opinion, the mandatory of ROTC should be brought back to the system, as this will result to a better outcome for Adamsonians, that instead of training students to be employees, we train them as a new breed of leaders that would help this country be lifted from the ground.
GRAPH:
[1] REPUBLIC ACT NO. 9163, January 23, 2002, Chan Robles, Virtual Law Library [online] Available at: http://www.chanrobles.com/republicactno9163.html [Accessed 25 February 2011]
[2] Adamson University, Registrar, 2011, Data Base [Accessed 23 February 2011]
[3] Patriotism is Dead? Senator blames it on lack of ROTC reservists, Written by Zofia Leal, Bulatlat on 2006 [Online] Available at: [Accessed on: 25 February 2010] http://www.bulatlat.com/news/6-43/6-43-rotc.htm
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