We investigated the secondary electron emission characteristics of MgO layer used as the protecting material in a.c. plasma display panel(a.c.-PDPs) using a pulsed ion beam technique, where the surface charging can be effectively suppressed during the measurement. The measurement of the secondary electron emission coefficients ($gamma$) on the surface of $SiO_2$ was carried out and then, it was found that the yields were dependent on incident ion energies. In addition, it was clearly demonstrated that the sputtering on MgO surface leads to lower yields, which suggests that the surface plays a key role on the operating conditions, such as life time, fast response, and etc.