THE Commission on Higher Education (CHED) has confirmed that the Nursing program of the Lyceum Northwestern University (LNU) in Dagupan City is not among those being monitored and reassessed for possible closure by the commission’s Technical Committee on Nursing Education.
 
In a letter to LNU President Gonzalo T. Duque, CHED Chair Carlito Puno disowned a newspaper report that listed LNU as among the 37 “very low performing nursing schools” with a board exam batting average of less than 30 percent from 2000 to 2004.
 

“Any information relayed to the public about any school to be phased out or closed down has not been authorized by the commission,” Puno said.
 
“Certainly, your institution does not fall in the category (of very low performing nursing schools),” he added.
 
Last December, LNU graduate Michelle Aglubat, placed 7th in the Nursing board examinations while 256 others passed it.
 
Puno also said in his letter that the applicability of the 30 percent minimum passing percentage that a nursing school must maintain under CHED Resolution No. 120, s. 2005 “will still be decided upon (by the commission) in a gradual basis.”
 
Duque had questioned before a Regional Trial Court in Dagupan City the validity of the said resolution and CHED Resolution No. 475 s. 2004 that set the minimum passing percentage on all courses at eight percent, saying these resolutions were arbitrary, illegal and malicious.
 
RTC Judge Rolando Mislang, in deciding to permanently stop the CHED from implementing the two resolutions, also enjoined CHED officials “from issuing further statements in media, print or television or through Internet or through any forum that is derogatory or damaging to the petitioners-intervenors.”
     
Duque had also earlier protested the method of grading the performance of colleges and universities offering the nursing course and other courses “as not reflective of the true and current quality of education.”
 
“We have protested the current method used by the Educational Statistics Task Force that over-generalizes the performance rating by averaging the passing percentage of both new graduates and old graduates,” Duque said.
 
Leonor Tripon-Rosero, chair of the Professional Regulation Commission, wrote Duque that the PRC has taken note of his concern but added that while her agency is “very much willing to grant your request, we need a resolution from CHED and/or CHED Technical Committee on Nursing Education.”
  
Duque asserted that only the performance of the new graduates should be the true basis for determining the current quality of education of a school, especially when the school is about to close its program.
 
“Even common sense tells us that the old graduates already represent an old standard, which has been invalidated by the upgrades implemented by the CHED. To lump them together into just one group would yield a statistics that is not reflective of the current standard,” Duque added.