Performance Analysis on Licensure Examination for Teachers among BEEd Graduates in DOrSU-San

: Performance Analysis on Licensure Examination for Teachers among BEEd Graduates in Dorsu-San Isidro Campus. Objective: This quantitative research study aimed to explore the Licensure Examination for Teachers results specifically compare the LEPT performances between graduates from AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019, and to the national passing rate . Methods: This study employed made use of the analytical method of research, and documentary analysis of data taken from the official results of LEPT released by the Professional Regulatory Commission (PRC) in the years 2017-2022. In addition, this study made use of frequency counts and percentage to describe the profile of LEPT takers. On the other hand, percentage was used in reporting the average or rating of graduates in their licensure examination. Moreover, T-test was used to examine the significant difference in the LEPT performances between graduates from AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019. Findings: When compared to national passing rate, results show that DOrSU performed best in September 2021. On the other hand, DOrSU performed low in March 2022. Also, the results from the t-test for equality of means show that there is no significant difference between the AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019 in terms of their ratings in LEPT. Conclusions: It is recommended that schools should create a mechanism in monitoring the performances of their graduates in their licensure examination.


 INTRODUCTION
On the onset of globalization, effort of all nations of the world is focused on improving the quality of their goods and services. This is to standstill in the midst of international economic competition; hence, the world is now an open market. Quality standards have been imposed as institutional control like trainings, certifications, retooling and licensing to assure quality of their products. While everyone is busy finding the effective formula for good performance, several learning institutions are forced to close their programs because of a poor performance.
Teacher Education graduates are required to take the Licensure Examination for Professional Teachers (LEPT) to exercise their profession. When a person passes the examination, he or she will not only gain prestige and honor, but also the competitive advantage over those who did not pass the LET (Pacheco & Allaga, 2014). Moreover, as the Philippines is set to the updates in its Basic Education Curriculum particularly in the K-12 curriculum, this does not only require academic excellence from teachers but also a license to teach, which can be achieved through passing the Licensure Examination for Teachers (LEPT) (Acosta & Acosta, 2016). Further, this is also seen in the work of Darling-Hammond (2022) who argued that having a license to teach is necessary to ensure that teachers who want to teach in a classroom are prepared to take on this responsibility. Furthermore, this is supported by Dagdag et al. (2017) who argued that passing the licensure exam has been the focus of the tertiary education institutions in the Philippines. They also added that these institutions may conduct benchmarking activities with other top performing schools in the said licensure examination. On the other hand, they exemplified that teachers must be carefully assigned to the subjects they are going to teach. Also, teachers are required to employ variety of teaching strategies to help learners effectively learn their lessons (Mangila & Mangila, 2022).
Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in the country place high regard in courses with licensure examinations. These institutions offering teacher education curriculum are establishing their brand of quality education by producing graduates who are performing well in their licensure examination for professional teachers. Hence, it is argued that the graduates' performance in their licensure examination is related to their academic achievement (Amanonce & Maramag, 2020). Moreover, they recommended that teacher education institutions should develop review programs, which will eventually help students and institutions in their licensure examinations performance.
Further, licensure examinations assess the graduates' performance in terms of their knowledge, competence and skills. In return, the graduates' performance in their respective licensure examinations implies whether their learning institutions are offering quality education or not (Balino & Baniaga, 2019).
Furthermore, licensure examination for professional teachers is considered as a major requirement for teachers in the Philippines to practice the teaching profession. Hence, it is argued that it is necessary to monitor the performance of graduates in their licensure examination especially as this will likely increase their passing rate (Fiscal & Roman, 2022).
It is said that schools have a great impact in shaping our nation. It is where people are trained to become responsible citizens of the country producing leaders, doctors, nurses, engineers, teachers, etc. However, in order for schools to perform such functions, competent teachers are needed. Hence, HEIs passing the licensure examination means he or she possess the necessary knowledge, competence or skills as a teacher (Nool & Ladia, 2017).
HEIs in the country offering Teacher Education Curriculum place high regards to their graduates' performance in the Licensure Examination for Professional Teachers (LEPT) as this indicates quality education. The PRC through the Republic Act 7836 otherwise known as the Philippine Teachers Professionalization Act of 1994 as amended by RA 9293 strengthen the supervision and regulation of the teaching profession. The commission then prescribed the Licensure Examination for Teachers (LET). This act prescribes that no person shall practice or offer to practice the teaching profession without having previously obtained a valid certificate of registration and a valid professional license from the Commission (Visco, 2015).
Every teacher education institution aims to produce quality graduates that will surely ace their licensure examination. To ensure this, it is suggested that schools should make a way to innovate their instruction practice (Quiambao et al., 2015). Moreover, they revealed that teachers' educational attainment, their length of service, library and laboratory facilities, students' intelligence quotient, and their grade point average (GPA) are some of the predictors of the LEPT performance of the graduates. Further, Solis-Foronda (2017) also revealed that students' college entrance exam and their grades are significantly related to their LEPT performance. Hence, she suggested that these should be the basis of the students' acceptance to the institution and for retaining them, respectively.
In the study conducted by Kalaw (2017), she revealed that education graduates are grouped according to their profile, a significant difference in the education graduates' performance in terms of the year LET was taken, GPA, and English Proficiency and Culture Fair Intelligence Tests results was noted. However, this was not the same in terms of their field of specialization. Moreover, in the study conducted by Nool and Ladia (2017), they revealed that a positive relationship exists between the number of first timers and LEPT performance of teacher education institutions. This means that the greater the number of first timers a school has, the greater is their possibility of getting a better performance. This study aimed to explore the Licensure Examination for Teachers results. Specifically, this study aims to determine the following: 1) what is the average LEPT performance of the BEEd graduates per batch compared with the National Passing Percentage; 2) what is the average ratings of DorSU-SIEC BEEd graduates of AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019 in general education, and professional education; and 3) is there a significant difference between the performance of DOrSU-SIEC Batch 2018 and DorSU-SIEC Batch 2019. While, there were some of the institutions offering degree courses with board courses were already closed due to not performing for the last three consecutive years. Finding model for success in licensure examination is now necessary for all learning institutions in the country to be practiced and be incorporated in the curriculum. Hence, this study was conducted. The monitoring of the performance of higher education institutions in board examinations provides the various stakeholders with significant information that will aid them in decision-making and in improving their policy. Hence, this was analysis was conducted.

 METHODS Participants
The study included the graduate of Bachelor of Elementary Education from DOrSU-San Isidro Campus who took the Licensure Examination for Professional Teachers (LEPT) for Elementary Level from year 2018-2022. The respondents of this study were chosen through purposive sampling technique.

Research Design and Procedures
This study made use of the analytical method of research, and documentary analysis of data taken from the official results of LEPT released by the Professional Regulatory Commission (PRC). This study included LEPT results from year 2018 to year

Instruments
The data used in this study were taken from the official results of LEPT released by the Professional Regulatory Commission (PRC).

Data Analysis
this study made use of frequency counts and percentage to describe the profile of LEPT takers. On the other hand, percentage was used in reporting the average or rating of graduates in their licensure examination. Moreover, T-Test was used to examine the significant difference in the LEPT performances between graduates from AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019. Further, SPSS was used in the investigation of t-test.
 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Comparison between the average LEPT performance with the National Passing Percentage (NPP)    Table 5 shows the T-Test table for   It can be deduced from the findings that LEPT takers who are graduates from AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019 performed fairly well in their licensure examination. In fact, DOrSU-SIEC produced Top 9 in September 2018, and Top 5 and 8 in September 2019. As previously mentioned, HEIs offering Teacher Education in the Philippines are creating their own brand of quality education through their graduates' performance in their LEPT. Thus, schools' performance in LEPT is a crucial criterion for quality assurance. With the significant impact of LEPT performance, HEIs are mostly compelled to have good performance and produce topnotchers (Amanonce & Maramag, 2020). On the other hand, Dela Rosa and Vargas (2021) found out that BEEd graduates have better performance in the various components of LEPT. Thus, HEIs are directed to conduct curriculum reviews periodically and implement admission and retention policies consistently to keep their students abreast with the societies' needs (Amanonce & Maramag, 2020). Moreover, high passing rate in the licensure examination indicates that the higher education institution is offering quality education to its graduates (Igcasama et al., 2021). They further argued that the school administrators of Teacher Education Institutions should ensure the proper implementation of their policies to help their students and as well as their faculty members improve more in terms of their performance. In fact, Trisnaningsih et al. (2019) argued that to acquire a teacher certification, many requirements must be met. Also, Ventayen (2020) suggested that teacher education institutions should strictly implement their admission policies such as requiring an average of 85 percent or more in their general average. Further, she argued that faculty-related factors must be considered as it is also a predictor of graduates' LEPT performance. This is supported by Werang et al. (2022) who argued that teachers especially when they are committed affect the school's achievement of its objectives. Thus, teachers are definitely helpful for students to succeed as they are seen as providers of social, emotional and cognitive support (Blegur et al., 2021). On the other hand, it is suggested that an intensive and comprehensive enhancement of the students' knowledge and competencies in taking LEPT should be must be provided as it is a significant predictor of their licensure examination performance (Gabasa & Raqueño, 2021).

 CONCLUSIONS
In the light of the abovementioned results, the following conclusion and recommendations were drawn: It can be concluded that DOrSU had the highest passing rate in September 2021 and a lowest passing rate in September 2018. Further, when compared to national passing rate, results show that DOrSU performed best in September 2021. On the other hand, DOrSU performed low in March 2022. Thus, in terms of passing rate, DOrSU has improved since from the previous years.
Along with the findings, it was evident that the graduates from AY 2018-2019 performed better in General Education while graduates from AY 2017-2018 performed better in Professional Education. Moreover, graduates from 2018-2019 performed better than graduates from 2017-2018 in their licensure examination based on overall average rating.
The results from the t-test for equality of means show that there is no significant difference between the AY 2017-2018 and AY 2018-2019 in terms of their ratings in LEPT. Thus, the null hypothesis stating that there is no significant difference in the LEPT performance in terms of academic year graduated was not rejected.
Licensure examination for professional teachers is considered as a major requirement for teachers in the Philippines to practice the teaching profession with that it is recommended that schools should create a mechanism in monitoring the performances of their graduates in their licensure examination. Passing the LEPT means a graduate was able to acquire the necessary knowledge, competence and skills as a teacher.
Further, It is said that schools have a great impact in shaping our nation. It is where people are trained to become responsible citizens of the country producing leaders, doctors, nurses, engineers, teachers, etc. With that, to keep the Teacher Education Curriculum responsive and relevant, schools should periodically conduct curriculum reviews and voluntarily submit to accreditation survey visits. This will help them ensure that they are offering quality services to their students.