Research Productivity of Select Secondary Schools in Central Luzon, Philippines

The present demand for institutional research productivity in Philippine Basic Education is triggered by a dismal national literacy rating in the 2018 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA). As 21st century facilitators of learning, teachers are enjoined to conduct education research and utilize its results in the planning, policy and program development as part of Basic Education Research Agenda. The recent statistics of 2019, however, reported only almost one (1) per cent productivity in a select School Division Office of the Department of Education. Using descriptive evaluative research design, 116 proficient teachers, 30 highly proficient teachers and eight (8) administrators – head teachers and school heads , this study evaluated the research productivity/output, needs and competencies and problems encountered in the basic education of a select secondary schools in Pampanga, Philippines though an adopted quantitative and qualitative survey questionnaires. The descriptive statistical analysis identified five (5) or 3.35 % full-blown Basic Education Research Fund (BERF) research output, 17 or 11.04 % full-blown non-BERF research output; 18 or 11.69% approved research proposals and 45 or 29.22% accepted research proposals. Moreover, the grand mean revealed the following as research competencies of the three respondents: grammar and sentence construction, writing introduction, constructing questions, interpretation and analysis of data, formulation of recommendation. On the hand, research format, formulating theoretical framework, using statistical tools, presentation of the data and correlation of the literature and expressing additional value to the present facts were the expressed needs of the thee respondents. Furthermore, the qualitative analysis pinpointed some problems encountered by the respondents/participants in conducting school-based research such as: slow research feedback mechanism, lack of technical skills (language, statistics, ICT), scarcity of available literature, changing research format, financial support, incentive mechanism and substantial workloads. These findings revealed the need for an enhanced and unified research feedback and monitoring mechanism, need-based capacity building, adoption of comprehensive collaborative research dynamics and school-based incentive mechanism.