The third nationwide staging of examinations for the Maritime Students Assessment Program, held on February 1-2, was successfully completed with 70 maritime colleges accredited by the Commission on Higher Education Accredited (CHED). A total of 7,131 second year maritime students; including 2,761 BSMarE and 6,463 BSMT majors participated. Major Philippine manning and professional associations also actively supported and participated in the event led by the Philippine-Japan Manning Consultative Council, Inc. (PJMCC), the Filipino Association for Mariners Employment (FAME), the Philippine Association of Manning Agencies and Shipmanagers, Inc. (PAMAS) and the International Maritime Association of the Philippines (INTERMAP).

MSAP 2008 aims to set a benchmark for Philippine maritime schools with the use of a nationwide standard examination given to all second year students taking up Bachelor of Science in Marine Transportation (BSMT) and Bachelor of Science in Marine Engineering (BSMarE). The examination covered various subjects such as English, Mathematics and basic Deck/Engine technical subjects with their own specific weight distribution. The examination’s goal was also to find the participating school’s strengths and areas for improvements based on the results as well as the performance of students who took the exam.

The examination, supported by the Philippine Association of maritime Institutions (PAMI) as well as several other non-member schools, gave maritime colleges a level playing field in terms of recruitment and employment for their students and graduates. A memorandum of agreement was recently signed by the Maritime industry and the Department of Labor and Employment together with the Overseas Workers Welfare Fund in which 200 scholarship awards would be given to deserving students as well as to encourage participation in the MSAP. The manning associations, which will benefit the most from this year’s MSAP, vowed to provide the exam’s top performers with cadetship shipboard training slots upon their completion of their respective academic requirements.

Aside from the MSAP, the manning associations also conducted a Re-Assessment on the MSAP’s previous takers to check if their respective schools took action to improve the students’ aptitude on Math, English and other technical subjects using a similar set of exam as last year. Out of fifty two schools who participated in the MSAP 2007, forty eight schools returned for the re-assessment. PJMCC together with FAME, PAMAS and INTERMAP also deployed a total of 104 proctors from member companies to the participating schools around the country.

MSAP was launched in Octoberr 2005 where 17 Maritime Schools attended. The following year saw the participation of 52 schools. With the success of the previous two MSAPs, the 2008 set for school year 2007-2008 was established with a target of 91 CHED- accredited maritime schools.