International Journal of Advanced Research in Management and Social Sciences

The Philippine National Police (PNP) as one of the bureaus of the Department Of Interior and Local Government of the Philippine government was created under Republic Act 6975. Republic Act 8551, an act providing for the reform and reorganization of the Philippine National Police, has amended some provisions of RA 6975. The PNP in order to attain its vision “the presence of professional, dynamic and motivated PNP personnel, the presence of resources, a collaborative partnership with stakeholders from the community, the presence of responsive, empowered and engaged citizenry who proactively take part in the fight against criminality to ensure a stable and peaceful community.” The respondents of the study were the PNP personnel who were not baccalaureate degree holders when they joined the organization in response to the provisions of RA 8551, Section 14-paragraph d. This included the Cagayan Police Provincial Office, the three (3) Provincial Mobile Groups, the twenty-seven (27) municipal police stations and one (1) city police station. This study made used of the descriptive correlational design Frankel and Wallen (1990, p. 113) Further, Sevilla (1991, p. 220) defined it as a design that help one determines the extent to which different variables are related to each other in the population of interest. This study utilized and developed sets of survey questionnaire to gather the data from the respondents. The questionnaire was categorized into four (4) parts. Part I consisted of the profile of the respondents. This included respondent's age, sex, civil status, highest educational attainment upon entry in the police service, rank, designation/position, eligibility, length of service, trainings/schoolings attended and study grants availed. Part II consisted of the importance of the Balik-Aral Program of the Philippine National with regards to personal aspect, professional aspect, economic aspect and performance aspect. Part III consisted of the problems being perceived by the respondents in finishing a degree and Part IV consisted of the interventions to cope with these problems. Professionalism of the police has been regarded to be an effective means of upgrading and improving the image of the police, hence the full implementation of the program on professionalization is being encouraged and undertaken. It is strongly recommended therefore that the respondents who are willing to pursue their studies to be able to finish a baccalaureate degree should be re-assigned to units/stations near the institutions which are ETEEAP providers.