More than 900,000 teachers in public elementary and secondary schools in the Philippines have received a performance-based bonus (PBB) for the fiscal year 2021, the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has announced.
The DBM said it had released a total of 11.6 billion pesos ($230m; £170m) to the Department of Education (DepEd) for the PBB, which is a merit-based incentive scheme that rewards employees based on their achievements and contributions.
DBM Secretary Amenah F. Pangandaman said the bonus was a recognition of the teachers’ extraordinary work amid the challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic.
“The DBM stands with our nation’s educators and recognizes their extraordinary work. President BBM instructed us not to neglect them. That is why we are one with our teachers in the pursuit of the immediate release of their PBB,” she said.
The DBM said it had issued the necessary documents to the DepEd for the PBB of the school-based personnel after evaluating and validating the submissions from April to August 2023.
The PBB is based on DepEd’s accomplishments for 2021, which were assessed by an inter-agency task force in January 2023.
The DBM said it was also reviewing the documents for the PBB of non-teaching personnel in eight regional offices, while another eight regional offices had been asked to revise and resubmit their documents due to various errors and inconsistencies.
