Lawmaker desires that schools teach Mandarin

We have english, Filipino as our language to learn and adding another language is something to think about. House Minority Leader Marcelino Libanan wants Mandarin Chinese to be taught in schools across the country.

He claimed that learning Mandarin would enable future workers to enter new lucrative labor markets in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, and China.

According to Libanan, elementary and high school students may form Mandarin-speaking clubs in addition to English-speaking clubs. In addition, he urged state universities and colleges to include Mandarin courses in their foreign language programs.

“We would urge the [Chinese-Filipino]… commerce and industry [group] in every city or province to do their share by offering Mandarin scholarships to students,” Libanan went on.

On second reading last week, the House of Representatives approved a bill prohibiting the use of the primary language of any given locality as a medium of instruction in Kindergarten through Grade 3.
The lack of learning materials in those languages was cited as a reason for the measure.