REPUBLIC ACT NO. 3458 - AN ACT ESTABLISHING A NATIONAL COORDINATING CENTER FOR THE STUDY AND DEVELOPMENT OF FILIPINO CHILDREN AND YOUTH, AND APPROPRIATING FUNDS THEREFOR.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the Philippines in Congress assembled:

SECTION 1. There is hereby established a National Coordinating Center for the Study and Development of Filipino Children and Youth which shall be charged with the duty of conducting and encouraging research among public and private schools, colleges, universities, institutions, agencies, organizations and entities interested in child and youth development with the end in view of making, the scientific and thorough study and understanding of Filipino children as the basis of a more effective educational system.

SEC. 2. The Center shall be governed by a Board of Trustees composed of the Secretary of Education, who shall be ex-officio chairman of the Board, or in his absence, the Undersecretary of Education; the Director of the Child Study Center, and five additional members who shall be renowned authorities or professors' or heads of departments in reputable, universities and colleges in any of the fields of education, medicine, nutrition, sociology, psychology, psychiatry, social work and allied fields.

SEC. 3. It shall be the duty of the Board of Trustees to plan a program of research, as well as to encourage, stimulate, initiate and coordinate study and research, and to distribute results of researches in children and youth to schools, colleges, universities, institutions, agencies, and organizations interested in the study and development of Filipino children and youth.

SEC. 4. The Board of Trustees shall be aided by the Director of the Child Study Center who shall be elected by the Board of Trustees and shall have the same qualifications as the other members of the Board. There shall be a clerical staff as well as a staff of experts and specialists preferably educational psychologists, psychiatrists, sociologists, and such other professionally qualified people to conduct research on a scientific level, who shall be appointed by the Board of Trustees upon the recommendation of the Director of the Child Study Center. The Board of Trustees shall appoint and fix the salaries of the above-named personnel in accordance with Civil Service Law, rules and regulations and promulgate rules and regulations for the operation of the Child Study Center.

SEC. 5. The Board of Trustees may, in its discretion, grant scholarship in research to gifted individuals interested in children as well as recommend money grants to schools, colleges, universities, institutions, organizations and agencies actually conducting research in Filipino children and youth.

SEC. 6. To carry out the purpose of this Act, the amount of five hundred thousand pesos is hereby appropriated, out of any funds in the National Treasury not otherwise appropriated, for the fiscal year nineteen hundred sixty-two to nineteen hundred sixty-three. Thereafter, the funds for this purpose shall be included in the annual General Appropriation Acts.

SEC. 7. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

Approved, June 16, 1962.