After a resolution was filed and approved in the City Council requesting that a regular Social Workers’ Licensure Examination be done in the City of Puerto Princesa, a similar move was also initiated at the provincial level.
Citing the economic advantages on the part of the examinees, the provincial legislature of Palawan requested the Professional Regulatory Commission (PRC) to consider their appeal which is now already approved on Third and Final Reading.
The resolution, authored by Board Member David Francis “Bon” Ponce de Leon of the First District, states that this measure is the government’s way to help the graduates “who want to take professional board examination for Social Work in the most convenient way.”
“It will be also considered as assistance to our young people in the province of Palawan, together with their parents, to support them in a little way in realizing their aspirations for a better future of their families,” read the resolution.
In the statistical data provided by Ponce de Leon, from 187 graduates of Western Philippines University (WPU) last 2018, only 115 of them managed to take the board exam while at Palawan State University (PSU), from 72 graduates, only 69 made it. Fortunately, last year, all the graduates from both schools took the exam.
The next licensure examination is scheduled this coming August, and more than 200 may take it since there are 123 candidates for graduation from PSU and more than 100 also from WPU.
Graduates of Bachelor of Science in Social Work should pass the Social Workers’ Licensure Examination conducted by the Board of Social Workers under the supervision of the PRC in order for them to become Registered Social Workers.
The Provincial Board reiterates that there is a need to produce more licensed social workers in the province of Palawan, one of the largest provinces in the Philippines, in order to sufficiently organize the province’s social service activities.