Assessing Teachers’ Readiness to Teach Peace Education in a Philippine State University

Abstract

Anchored to the theory of transformative education, this study determined the teachers' readiness to teach peace education in terms of knowledge, attitude and values, and skills. This paper employed the quantitative research design particularly the descriptive-comparative approach. The respondents were the total enumeration of 55 state university teachers. It was responded to using a validated and reliability-tested questionnaire and was analyzed using descriptive and inferential tools. The results revealed that the teachers possessed a high readiness level to teach peace education. In sex, both male and female possessed a high readiness level to teach peace education. Likewise, in educational attainment, the result was a consistently high readiness level for both bachelor's and postgraduate degrees. In campus affiliation, both campuses had teachers with high readiness to teach peace education. Meanwhile, there was no difference in their readiness when grouped by sex, educational attainment, and campus affiliation. However, a difference was revealed in skills when grouped to campus affiliation, in favor of teachers on the main campus who possessed a higher readiness level compared to teachers from the external campuses. Nevertheless, this did not affect the general result. Hence, the teachers' readiness is essential in materializing peace education. Here, the researcher recommends the inclusion of Peace Education as a stand-alone subject, and that the university administration should give formal training to teachers. In addition, the university, in line with mainstreaming peace education through curriculum innovation, should promote harmonized curricula and pedagogical standards toward an effective peace education program in state colleges and universities. Finally, to be abreast with this innovation, the university must also be established as a center for peace education.