I’ve read a front-page article about pupil illiteracy in the Philippines from the August 17 edition of The Philippine Star — a daily newspaper in nationwide circulation. The article, entitled Only 6 of 100 Grade 6 pupils ready for high school — study, showed statistics of disappointing value. But, I am not going to talk about it here.
I guess, you’ll say, But, why did you start with that topic?
Oh, I have a reason. I think Sandy Araneta, the author of the article, is one of those “pupils” not ready for high school! She said in her first sentence, Fewer than one percent of Filipino students are high school and college material…
Fewer than one percent? I thought you’ve just said 6 of 100 in the title? Six of 100 is 6%. And, all of the other numbers you mentioned inside the article referring to the Grade 6 pupils stated 0.6 percent
, or only six out of every 1,000
!
Please, please, try to make it right everytime. I would also like to mention your editors though I do not know who they are. Yes, we make mistakes, but (all of) you are writing in a nationwide newspaper and your Math and proofing aren’t even correct! I think that’s one evidence to really say illiteracy is widespread in the country.
To the writer and editors from The Philippine Star: I’m sorry for the harsh comparisons and descriptions written here. I admit I was a little bit exaggerating.
Note: Image scanned without permission from August 17 edition of The Philippine Star.
Note: The incident was reported by email to the webmaster of philstar.com. In response to that, the webmaster told me that the editors were informed about the error they have committed.