DepEd partners with UNESCO, KOICA for alternative education

The Department of Education (DepEd) has partnered with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) in a project that will provide quality alternative education to out-of-school girls in the Philippines.

Dubbed the “Better Life for Out-ofSchool Girls to Fight Against Poverty and Injustice in the Philippines,” the project primarily aims to help improve the quality of life for girls living in poverty through the establishment and operation of a Girls Education Center (GEC).

The alternative education to be provided at the GEC will seek to increase the passing rate among out-of-school girls who take the Accreditation and Equivalency Test after completing the DepEd’s Alternative Learning System (ALS).

The $6-million project also seeks to improve the quality of instructional knowledge and skills of ALS mobile teachers and implement the use of K to 12 ALS teaching and learning materials for outof-school girls.

Tacloban City and Palo town in Leyte will be the project’s pilot locations.

“Education is a basic human right enshrined, protected and promoted by the Philippine Constitution, but gender-based disadvantage is a reality that Filipinas, especially the youth, still encounter,” Education Secretary Leonor Briones stated during the project’s launch at the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization Regional Center for Educational Innovation and Technology in Quezon City.

“As we continue expanding and intensifying the delivery of education for all through K to 12 and ALS, we are thankful to partner organizations in helping us reach learners who are isolated by their varying personal circumstances,” Briones said.

The project is anchored on a study that identified a multitude of economic, health, social and other challenges faced by learners, especially girls, resulting in dropping out of schools.

“(A)ppropriate educational services for vulnerable classes, such as out-of-school girls, are essential for enhancing social inclusion and welfare. In this regard, this project is very meaningful because it provides these girls with alternative learning opportunities and helps them complete their basic education,” Korean Ambassador Kim Jae-shin shared.

UNESCO offered its experience, expertise and network of experts in education as support for the DepEd.

“UNESCO is committed in supporting the government of the Philippines… in its efforts toward the attainment of Sustainable Development Goal 4-Quality Education… most especially in its efforts to bring quality, accessible, relevant and liberating basic education for all with focus for those children who are the lost, last and least,” UNESCO Jakarta office director Shahbaz Khan said.