ANNUAL REPORT

THE PRESIDENT’S REPORT
by: Dr. Gilbert T. Sadsad

Today, we mark another milestone in PPSTA’s history as this National Representative Assembly (NRA) is the first one since 2005 that we can consider our very own after about seventeen (17) long years that our Association was directly ruled by the Insurance Commission via a conservatorship regime. For those who are yet unaware, yes, PPSTA was finally freed from conservatorship effective October last year, the earliest and greatest Christmas gift PPSTA has ever received in 2022, when your current Board of Trustees was just about four (4) months in the service. For our liberation, let us give ourselves especially those who have really worked extremely hard in making this dream a reality, a big round of applause.

My dear friends, during the turnover ceremony, we, your Board of Trustees signed a Manifesto of Commitment to PPSTA and to the General Membership, which I quote:

“As the Philippine Public School Teachers Association (PPSTA) enters into a new era of independence from conservatorship, We, your Board of Trustees and employees, manifest and take this pledge to commit ourselves, with utmost sincerity and dedication, to uphold the objectives of the Association for the purpose of promoting the interest and welfare of the Philippine public school systems and of public education personnel. We likewise commit and pledge to observe the principles and rules of Good Corporate Governance as enshrined in the Code of Corporate Governance for Insurance Regulated Companies and to raise the standards thereof in the management and governance of the Association. We will raise the bar and do our jobs with extraordinary diligence, just like the diligence of a good father of a family. We commit ourselves to sustain these gains of being financially stable and to continuously be vigilant in protecting the general interest and welfare of its members and the Association.

We cannot do this alone. We need each other’s help and support. Tap our backs or call our attention if we are heading the wrong direction. All of us must continue the vigilance. Not just the Board, not just the Management, not just the employees nor the individual members.

All of us will do our parts.
After all, PPSTA is for the teachers and by the teachers.
As incumbent Board of Trustees, with strong conviction, we say:
No, Never Again to conservatorship…”

One (1) year and two (2) months after regaining back our corporate freedom, I am sure many of you will ask the Board, how do you fare yourselves as the ones entrusted with the responsibility of protecting the best interest not only of the general membership but of the Association as a whole?

Ladies and gentlemen, being the President of our prestigious organization while a great honor is actually a humbling experience. Yes, we are all educators and educator-leaders and as such, we all have that technical know hows in the delivery of quality education to our learners, but being at the helm of a corporation, is another story. It involves subjecting yourself to continuous learning process on how to run the Association based on the tenets of good corporate governance. Hence, I thank, firstly, the Lord above for the wisdom and strength to carry this gargantuan of a responsibility, secondly, you our dear teacher-leaders and the general membership for the trust and confidence, thirdly, my colleagues in the Board of Trustees for all the support and the positive synergy as we take on our duties and responsibilities in the organization, and of course, last but definitely not the least, the PPSTA Management and the rest of the employees.

Our partnership and collaborations led to a commanding financial portfolio of P8.67 B total assets, members’ equity of P3.46 B and net income before legal reserves of P413 M as presented earlier by the General Manager. With these and all others, let us give ourselves our warmest applause.

We hope and pray that with all of us working together and with God’s grace, PPSTA will continue to soar high and serve the very purpose of its existence as the foremost ally of public school educators.

My fellow teacher-leaders, I now come to the most important part of my presentation. You may ask me and the rest of the members of the Board, what have you done over the past months and what will you do to realize your commitment to us and to the members that we represent. And so, on behalf of my colleagues in the service, allow me to present our accomplishments from the time that we assumed office on July 1, 2022 up to the present. Of course, some of which are continuing programs and activities which were started by our predecessors such as our continuous representation in both Houses of Congress during legislation of bills intended for education and educators and our strong participation in various committees of the Department of Education (DepEd). But for emphasis, I wish to elaborate on our remarkable initiatives:

1. Strengthened ties with international teachers’ organizations particularly, the ASEAN Council of Teachers+1 (ACT+1) and Education International (EI)

During the first part of the conservatorship period, we placed our partnerships with ACT+1 and EI at the sidelines but we renewed our ties in 2008. Henceforth, we regularly send delegates to every ACT+1 convention. Modesty aside, the Philippines, through PPSTA, always has the biggest international delegation in all ACT+1 conventions. Moreover, our hosting of the same event in December 2010 and September 2018 were widely applauded.

Last year, the Teachers’ Association of the Republic of Indonesia hosted the convention. This year, it was hosted by Malaysia’s National Union of the Teaching Profession (NUTP). For 2024, the host will be Thailand through the Teachers’ Council of Thailand also known as Khurusapha. We will issue a memo regarding the 2024 ACT+1 Convention once the details are made available.

Conventions initiated by these organizations are great avenues to further enhance and enrich the teaching skills and knowledge of the participants in the field of education as they get to expose themselves to various best practices in other countries.

2. Empowerment of regional sub-offices
We have thirty-one (31) sub-offices located in strategic areas across the country. Twenty-nine (29) of which are capable already of processing loan applications. It must be emphasized however that we can now utilize online processing of both membership and loan applications.

3. Adoption of more convenient modes of releasing transaction proceeds
To provide convenience to the members and other clients in receiving their transaction proceeds, we now release them through the bank remittance system of Banco de Oro (BDO). Further, members or claimants can request that the check be deposited in their respective bank accounts. Furthermore, effective October 5 last year, we started to implement online direct deposit of loan proceeds to elected bank account of member-borrowers through Eastwest’s facility.

4. Roving PPSTA Drives

A Roving Team is like a one-stop-shop of PPSTA that goes to the grassroots and handle onsite presentations about the Association as well as its plan and programs, queries and processing of membership and loan applications. As regards onsite processing however, we wish to manifest that application approvals can only be made once cleared by a DepEd verifier as required under the DepEd APDS rules.

Should you want roving activities in your area, please do not hesitate to contact our Marketing Team.

5. Intensification of Sariling Sikap Loan Program

Started last year, the maximum loanable amount under the Sariling Sikap Loan Program or SSL Program has been increased from P 300,000.00 to P 500,000.00 under a longer maximum paying period of five (5) years. We take pride in the fact that our interest rates are relatively lower with our contractual interest rates per annum set at 6.5% for 1-year term, 7% for 2-year term, 7.5% for 3-year term, 8% for 4-year term and 8.5% for 5-year term.

Please note however that the grant of the maximum loanable amount is anchored on several factors and circumstances such as, but not limited to, payment remittance efficiency of the region where the borrower comes from.

6. Teacherific Program

Designed to engage educators in the creation of credible and impactful social media contents to enhance the learning experience for individuals worldwide.

7. Automatic Monthly Generation of Solicitor’s Honorarium

If you will note, existing PPSTA members are entitled to solicitor’s honorarium for every recruited member at the rate of P100.00 for the New Mutual Aid System (NMAS) and P150.00 for the Mutual Retirement Benefit System Plus (MRBS+). Before, a solicitor’s honorarium is released only upon request by the concerned member-solicitor. But we have already changed this. The Management generates solicitor’s honorarium and release the same on a monthly basis. I wish however to clarify that a member recruiter will only be entitled to this honorarium upon the first deduction of the premium payment in the salary of the recruit.

8. Knowledge for ALL Program

Provides free training and seminars on a wide range of subjects relevant to the education sector. The sessions are meticulously curated to offer practical knowledge, skills, and insights that directly benefit DepEd officers and staff in their professional roles.

9. PPSTA Sponsorship Program

Subject to certain qualifications and guidelines, the program allows PPSTA to sponsor various activities and events of the Department of Education and BARMM’s Ministry of Basic, Higher, and Technical Education.

10. Benepisyo Protektado Program of 2023
One of our biggest initiative this year is the implementation of “Benepisyo Protektado Program of 2023” or BPP which is actually an in-house credit life insurance program crafted to provide credit life insurance (CLI) for all salary-deducted loan programs of the Association, particularly the following:

1.) Sariling Sikap Loan
2.) Calamity Loan
3.) Educational Loan

BPP which is provided at no cost on the part of our member-borrowers is intended to pay-off members’ outstanding salary-deducted loan in case of their untimely demise during the loan term. Through this, they can be assured of their full benefits under the mutual benefit programs so long as their membership thereto remain active at death and they do not have arrears in premium or unpaid certificate/equity loan.

11. System Migration Project
The current PPSTA Computerized System was designed and developed using Visual Foxpro 5 language running on a Microsoft Operating System. Subsequent to its development, it was upgraded to Visual Foxpro 9. Unfortunately, this Visual Foxpro 9 is the end of the line language and is now considered obsolete. Otherwise stated, no further upgrading of the language can be made. Hence, the Management encounters database limitations and sluggish system run resulting to delays in outputs and production. The worst-case scenario is a system crash which we do not want to happen as the PPSTA System actually contains the entire business of the Association.

To resolve this urgent concern, the Board approved the proposal to migrate the system to another language in order to ensure efficacy not only of our system but of our workforce as well. The project is ongoing right now and we expect that it will be finished within the 1st quarter of 2024.

12. PPSTA Buildings
All of PPSTA’s 5 Buildings are several decades old already. To determine their structural integrity and for the peace of mind of everyone especially the occupants, we subjected all these buildings to Structural Assessment/Investigation. The results established the fact that generally, they are structurally safe but we have to subject them to retrofitting in order to align with the Building Code and other laws and ordinances.

As of now, we have already issued a notice to bid for the retrofitting and renovation of PPSTA Building 2. If you know of a company or group that we can rely on, you may invite them to participate in the bidding process. For this purpose, you may coordinate with our Administration Department.

As regards PPSTA Building 5 which was previously leased out to the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) and which is consist of more than 10,000 square meters, instead of spending large sum of money for its retrofitting, we are looking into the possibility of establishing a partnership with a developer for a Build-Operate-Transfer Scheme. If you know of a developer who is interested on this agreement, please feel free to discuss the same with our General Manager.

13. Free One (1) Year Basic Plan Membership for Regional Directors, Assistant Regional Directors, Schools Division, Superintendents and Assistant Schools Division Superintendents

In light of their invaluable contributions to the Association, PPSTA offers free one (1) year basic plan membership to the Regional Directors, Assistant Regional Directors, Schools Division Superintendent and Assistant Schools Division Superintendents.

14. Educational Assistance Program
Subject to established terms and conditions, the program provides opportunities to deserving teacher-members in the furtherance of their studies for their professional growth and development.

15. PPSTA Kaisa sa Brigada Eskwela
Launched during the 70th Anniversary Celebration of the Association in 2017, the program was crafted to augment the existing resources of DepEd for the annual Brigada Eskwela. It is intended to extend resources, financial or otherwise, to deprived, depressed and underserved public schools across the country on a yearly basis. The program allocates a budget of P10,000.00 for each schools division.

16. Search for Outstanding Teachers, Non-Teaching Personnel, School Heads, Officials and Local Chapters
The search aims to recognize the exemplary and outstanding performance and accomplishments of classroom teachers, non-teaching personnel, school heads, and DepEd Officials who are active PPSTA members. It also recognizes Local Chapters’ valuable contributions in the promotion and upliftment of the welfare of teachers.
The Board has already instructed the Marketing Department to prepare the draft guidelines for the search which will be conducted annually beginning next year.

17. Waiver of Surcharge on Overdue Loan Accounts ao June 2023
Based on records, 5,027 borrowers with inactive/delinquent members have overdue loan accounts with an aggregate amount of P303.771 M, inclusive of surcharges amounting to P 73.657 M. As part of PPSTA’s initiative to collect payments, an offer was made to all concerned borrowers to settle their accounts within the year so they can be relieved from paying the corresponding surcharges of their loan balance.

18. Free Insurance Coverage of P 25,000.00 for Teacher-Members Who Serve During Election
Teacher-members who serve as Board of Election Inspectors (BEIs) or Supervisory Officers during elections are guaranteed with a free life insurance coverage of P25,000.00. This free insurance is of course, on top of their life insurance coverage under their PPSTA plan/s.

During the Board Meeting held last October 13, the Board passed Resolution No. 2023-57 approving the recommendation of the Management to forge a partnership with Globe Telecoms for its Gcash Services. The Management is now in the process of facilitating the rollout of the system. This partnership will provide convenience to the members in remitting their payments to PPSTA. Suffice it to state, Gcash users can pay their dues to the Association even at the comforts of their homes using the Gcash platform FREE of charge.

We are also studying the possibility of further enhancing our mutual benefit programs specifically, the New Mutual Aid System (NMAS) and the Mutual Retirement Benefit System Plus (MRBS Plus) so that these programs will be made more affordable and responsive to the teachers nationwide.

I take this opportunity to inform you as well of our asset in Laoag City, Ilocos Norte which we consider as “idle” as the same is unproductive and yet, we are obligated to pay its yearly taxes. This property is consist of a net useable area of roughly 700,000 square meters, a reduction of more or less, 300,000 square meters from the original area of 1,000,186 square meters. The decrease in area is mainly due to roads and a bridge constructed on the property. This is the reason why we are claiming just compensation from the City Government of Laoag. Personally, I feel the need to dispose the property via a sale so we can make use of the purchase price to fund our other projects like acquisition of other real property. Given the history of the property when both the National Government and the Local Government were able to acquire portions thereof, the idea of encroachment on other portions is not far-fetched. Yes, the move may have benefitted communities in the area but it prejudiced the interest of our organization.

So, you see my dear brothers and sisters, what we do in PPSTA is always for the common good of the members and the best welfare of our beloved Association. In fact, the income we derive from our operations are translated into worthwhile projects, programs, advocacies and activities for all of us as PPSTA’s stakeholders.

We have committed ourselves to serve and protect the organization and we implore your aid. Earlier, the General Manager reported on our attrition rate. She stressed the need to boost our membership generation initiatives as PPSTA thrives by the number. It is our hope that we do our share in enriching our membership portfolio. In fact, as your President, it is my wish that everyone can make a pledge on membership generation because I, for one, stands with PPSTA in being the forefront of excellence and quality services for teachers’ welfare and professional development.

I have taken much of our time but before I end my report, let me leave with these words: “With all of us around sharing PPSTA’s dreams, everything is possible. We will be together in this journey and no matter what, we will carry on.”

“Bayani ka, Gurong Pilipino. Ang PPSTA, kumakalinga sa iyo!”

Thank you very much and good morning!

THE GENERAL MANAGER’S REPORT
by: Atty. Marilyn “Gie” DV. Gallanosa

Distinguished guests and members of the 44^th National Representative Assembly (NRA) of the Philippine Public School Teachers Association, a very lovely morning!

Before I formally render my report, may I ask that I be given a few minutes of your time as I think that I cannot let pass this golden opportunity of introducing myself to you, our dear teacher-members and grassroot leaders. We owe it all to you as you play that enormous role of being the face of our beloved Association in your respective communities.

To begin with, I have been with PPSTA since 2016 as an Independent Trustee appointed by the Insurance Commission (IC) and since then, I have found a deep connection with the organization, probably because it has been my dream since childhood to become a teacher. But fate led me to a different path and I became a lawyer. I may have teaching-related jobs as such but I know in my heart that it’s relatively different when you mold the young ones and help them shape not only their own future but moreso, the future of our society.

Factoring out rhetorics, I really have the highest respects and admiration for teachers. And you can just imagine how thankful I am to have been blessed with the privilege of serving you, to the best of my ability, as the General Manager of PPSTA, our mother organization.

For the past two (2) decades, I have been juggling works with different entities, both private and local ones. And my portfolio can pretty much sum up my line of works and the commitment I give to each of them. I commit the same and more to PPSTA.

And so, as your General Manager, I now stand before you today taking on the duty incumbent upon me as such, to present PPSTA’s Statement of Financial Affairs based on the audited financial statement as of December 31, 2022 with comparative figures for four (4) years back.

As to PPSTA’s total assets, from P 6.05 B in 2018, the figure ballooned to P 8.67 B as of the end of December last year, an increase of almost P 3 B. Two of the major components of these assets are guaranty fund and investment at P 3.05 B and the biggest at P 3.21 B are our loan receivables.

PPSTA’s total liabilities stands at P 5.21 B, P 4.81 B of which is our legal reserve liability. Claims and retirement benefit payables is P 383 M and retirement benefit obligation to employees is set at P 21 M.

Members’ Equity or the excess of total assets against total liabilities was recorded at P 3.46 B. The continuous increase in members’ equity since 2018 is indicative of PPSTA’s good business management despite the excruciating effects of the global wide pandemic which started in 2020.

PPSTA’s income is derived from insurance/policy premia, interest from loans receivables, investments and building rentals. At the end of 2022, PPSTA generated a total of P 1.02 B revenues which is P 93 M higher than the total revenues as of end of 2021. Please note that in 2020 and 2021, we failed to hit that P 1 B mark in revenues but the scenario is acceptable considering that these are peak years of the covid pandemic. What’s good to note now however that for the last 2 years, our revenues have been increasing.

Total expenses is composed of benefit payments and operating as well as administrative expenses. As of end of 2022, our total expenses reached P 615 M, P 475 M of which were spent for benefit payments and P 140 M for operating and administrative expenses.

Net income before legal reserves was recorded at P 413 B in 2022 indicating an increase of P 74 M from the figure of P 339 M in 2021.

PPSTA’s loan operations is the major key contributor in the continuously increasing net worth of the Association. As shown in the graphical representation, the accumulated Sariling Sikap Loan earnings for 2022 was at an imposing figure of P 4.18 B. As of now, it actually sustains the operations of our mutual benefit programs. Hence, we are looking into the possibility of further enhancing these programs as they should be able to sustain liquidity on their own or, better yet, we join hands and work altogether to make them self-sustaining by increasing of course, the number of the planholders or members.

Thank you very much and Mabuhay ang PPSTA!