The reality that some courses are attracting more takers than others, certain courses attract a disproportionately large number of students. This oversubscription poses challenges for both educational institutions and aspiring learners.

In the Eastern Visayas consisting of the Island Province of Biliran, Leyte, Southern Leyte, Samar ( Western), Eastern Samar, there are 87 Institutions of Higher Learning it consists of 10 State Universities and Colleges, 28 Satellite Campuses and 46 Private HEIs. Using the AY 2023 Data available in the Commission on Higher Education Website it has a total of 207,599 enrollees.

The most popular course or Program is Bachelor of Criminal Justice Education ,popularly known as BS Criminology and Bachelor of Elementary Education, Bachelor of Secondary Education or Education Courses.

What gives or what would be the reasons of going through into the throngs and lining up towards this program?

For Education students here are a few random thoughts of a few respondents when they were asked why they have chosen the said program?

1. Stability, a few students of BS Elementary Education and BS Secondary Education declared that they see the program as stable, with steady demand of having more teachers because of the constant demand for quality education and the yearly increase of enrollees in basic education.

2. Influence from parents and relatives who are teachers themselves. This reason was the second frequent reply. It is a family influence so to speak.

3. Perceived Government Support .- The Constitution provides allocating more to the field of education and it has always been a cornerstone of every politician’s narrative .
Criminology programs, leading to a Bachelor of Science in Criminology (BSCRIM), also witness oversubscription. Here is why:

1. Media Influence: Crime-related TV shows, movies, and news stories romanticize law enforcement and criminal investigation. As a result, young individuals aspire to become police officers, investigators, or forensic experts.

2. Career Opportunities: Criminology graduates can work in various fields, including law enforcement, private security, and corrections. The allure of exciting and impactful careers draws many students to this field.

3. Public Safety Concerns: The Philippines faces security challenges such as crime, terrorism, and drug-related issues. As a result, there is a perceived need for more criminology professionals to maintain public safety.

4. Bigger Pay -undoubtedly the police and other uniformed personnel are enjoying higher pay than most public servants, owing to the risks that they have in their jobs.
The challenge for HEIs is to enact or do major modifications of their ways of doing things to address the oversubscription on the said courses.

Humbly, this public servant forwards the following suggestions.

1. Alternative Career Paths:-Encourage students to explore alternative career options within education and criminology. For example, education graduates can work in curriculum development, educational technology, or school administration.

2. Career Counseling and Awareness:-Educational institutions should provide comprehensive career counseling to help students make informed choices. Highlight lesser known but equally rewarding career paths related to these fields

3. Quality over Quantity: Institutions should focus on maintaining high standards of education rather than accommodating excessive student numbers.

Oversubscription can strain resources and compromise the quality of education. It will also lead to unemployment due to the sheer number of students and graduates of these two programs.

WITH the celebration of the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, what we are most reminded of is this incredible truth of our faith that Christ wants us to assume his very Body and Blood, if only to be truly one with him as we should since we are patterned after him, are that we are the image and likeness of God and sharers of God’s divine nature and life.

We should just try our best, always asking for God’s grace first of all, to adapt our thinking and the awareness of our true identity to this truth of our faith. To do that we should also try to follow Christ’s example, who being God emptied himself to become like us.

That is why Christ himself said that to follow him, we should deny ourselves, and given our wounded condition due to sin, we also cannot avoid having to carry the cross that first of all is the consequence of all of our sins, so that carrying it with him we can convert it into a means of our salvation.

That is also why Christ strongly exhorted us to be willing to lose even our life for Christ’s sake so we can have the real life meant for us, a life with God. (cfr. Mt 10,39) We need to spend time meditating on these words of Christ so we can build a strong, deep and abiding faith in them, and find concrete ways of how to put them into practice.

In a sense we have to be like empty vessels, a biblical term first referred to in 2 Kings 4,1-6 where a woman, troubled by the creditors of her dead husband, was asked to get as many empty vessels so that oil can be poured into them to pay for her husband’s debt.
That term has come to mean our need to empty ourselves so that the oil of God can fill us, which is the condition or state that is proper to us. We have to empty ourselves of our own selves, so to speak, so that the spirit of God, the spirit that is proper to us since we are God’s image and likeness, can fill us.

This need has been referred to several times in the New Testament, in particular in the Second Letter of St. Paul to Timothy: “If anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.” (2,21)

Let’s remember that God being our creator and savior through Christ in the Holy Spirit, it’s he who actually directs our life toward its fulness and perfection. We should find ways of how we can discern his constant guidance and how we can be most receptive to his inspirations and graces. The ideal condition for us is to be constantly aware of what he is showing us and to follow him as closely as possible.

Thus, we can already deduce from these considerations that we really need to be contemplative souls even and especially when we are right in the middle of the world which, in the first place, is where God placed us to test us to see if what he wants us to be is also what we ourselves would like to be.

We need to try our best to convert ourselves into real contemplative souls, the means for which are actually readily and abundantly available to us.