DepEd Cyber Education Project gets funding

is this a public cyber education?

indeed it is for public cyber education… i hope people will be vigilant and make sure that these fundings will really put the schools connected to the cyberspace

Hi,
Its nice that DepEd is working for improvement of ICT in Education process. However, sad to note that some IT teachers in DepEd where not ask about the needs and problems that we are facing in the semi high tech computer rooms.

visit us at STEP www.freewebs.com/depedstep/ and www.mnshs.co.nr

Hi
one more thing, i notice the links in you navigation bar. Can you add our depedteacher.blogspot.com and the STEP site at www.freewebs.com/depedstep/

thx
jobette

Hi Greg,
Thanks for adding the link. I do appreciate it. Actually, the STEP is an organization under DepED that manage the ICT competition, project and monitoring under TLE subject. Although its officials are from DepEd, i assured you that the officers are the finest in the DEPED. Normally these are the trainors in different DepEds division and Regions. STEP is regularly held starting September (Division level), October (Regional) and November (National). Competition not only focused on ICT alone. There are competition like radio assembly, house wiring, floor plan, livestock production, budding, fertilizer mixing, bartending, table setting, mural painting, silk screen painting and many more. you visit the (www.freewebs.com/step) again to see all the technological contest for high school either private and public.

Many thx again

I just have one question. What about content? Why is the subject of “content” not fully explained by DepEd? If there is one thing I’m sure they will find hard to do, it
would be to fill that “12 video channels” with educational content. To give you an example, Sky Foundation’s Knowledge channel have been doing educational programming since the mid 90’s. It
is but one channel yet they find it hard to produce local educational content and have already resorted to rehashing ABS-CBN educational shows, and importing canned educational programs, some of which are obviously
obsolete.

I don’t know if you know this, but the government also tried their hand in producing educational content in 2000 and produced a good enough product in “Eskwela ng Bayan”, yet I don’t know why they stopped this project - a
case of ningas cogon maybe? Anyway “Eskwela ng Bayan” aired 4 educational programs on channel 4 before, now, these government produced educational programs finds airtime in the Knowledge Channel.

To address content, they will have to either produce their own shows, borrow and rehash existing locally produced shows, or buy canned programs abroad, all of which will entail considerable cost.

Their answer to “content” based on their press release says that there will be “live broadcasts featuring lectures and presentations from master teachers as well as course wares on demand and other valuable
resource materials.” First of all, save for the highly boring “Constel” lecture series, DepEd does not have any other course wares and valuable resource materials that are broadcast worthy to speak of. Again, these course
wares and resource materials, and even that live broadcast of master-teacher lectures will definitely entail cost. Is it covered in the $466 million budget, or is the budget only for setting up the CEP system?

They have the gall to boast of 12 channels to be filled up with educational content with networking and internet connectivity to boot, yet there’s no clear vision on what sort of information they will channel through these information media.

And mind you, content isn’t simple. You have to realize that if you are talking of say one master teacher teaching one subject for example to one grade level simultaneously across the archipelago, you have to ask yourself, “what language will I use to simultaneously teach students in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao? English?
Filipino? Are the comprehension level of students from these areas the same? Should I teach fast or should I teach slowly? Surely the experiences of children from Mindanao would differ from the experiences of children in Northern Luzon, how can I make an example or analogy that would work in both cultures? See how hard it is? And
I’m only talking of one program here. If they are gunning for 12 channels with both channels having 8-12 hour programming, you are looking at 144-hours worth of educational content or 288 30-minute educational shows per day! If you are going to produce half of the shows you are looking at 15 million pesos in production cost just to cover half of daily programming - do the math.

If the Government is REALLY sincere in wanting to go through with the CEP program, they have to concentrate first on content. Produce or procure shows that would be effective in teaching our multi-cultural target audience. Pilot test these programs using Knowledge Channel,
Channel 4 and Ayala Foundation’s existing cyber education delivery systems. Yes, we already have an existing albeit “crude” CEP. Knowledge Channel gives out cable
connections to many public and private schools and together with Eskwela ng Bayan, they also give out TV sets to far flung areas. The Cultural Center has a tie up with Dream Cable and they beam cultural programming to schools as well. Ayala on the other hand gives out computers and internet connection. So in a way, there is indeed already an existing CEP, but what they don’t have is CONTENT and this is one area where DepEd could probably help.

The multi million dollar program would be good if indeed the money would go to such program and not end up in the coffers of corrupt DepEd Officials or worse, to those that will be running in 2010. If the Government is really sincere in coming up with this dream program, let us see them come up with suitable content to fit in the 12 channels they’re talking about first. Knowing how lazy and inexperienced people in DepEd are in this field of media production, I doubt if they could even
match the output of the producers of the defunct Eskwela ng Bayan.

Hi Greg,

As much as I’d like to believe that democratizing content creation is the way to go, experience tells me otherwise.

Educational content creation is not a simple thing. Not any regular person with a camera and a computer SHOULD be given a license to produce educational content without any guidelines and guiding entity to direct them in making such.

Sure the artistic and aesthetic elements would be there (but looking at most of what is on the internet now, this is even debatable) but more importantly, there should be someone to supervise the approach, and the informative elements present in such content. For example, if you teach 3-6 year-old kids numbers, the best way to do it is probably through the “sesame street” style with characters, animation, vivid colors and storytelling. Teaching them numbers ala “Constel” straight-forward with a teacher and a blackboard just wouldn’t cut it. Kids have very short attention spans and with the internet and cable television, that attention span gets shorter and shorter everyday.

Now, if you decide to do a “reading” subject program, what stories are you going to tell? Hans Christian Anderson - Disney storybook tales? Why not tap into our own culture and tell our own stories instead, from the Heroics of Lam-And to Rizal’s own “the monkey and the turtle”? Who would tell these content providers what to make? Who would give these democratized educational video makers direction? Would they go out of their way to search for the works or “Huseng Sisiw”? Or would they be just googling their works content and feed the Filipino children with more western trash?

Same is true with Math and Science problems. Would your content providers use homegrown examples and analogies? Or would they stick to the book and just make an animation out of it? Every word your program host utters, every example she uses should conform to standards otherwise you might end up teach math using slang.

Working with people from DepEd and media for a couple of educational projects, I believe I would be in a position to tell you guys that if you let DepEd people handle content creation, you would end up with a multi-million-dollar Cyber Education System full of ineffective content. Last time I worked with them, DepEd people couldn’t even come up with a bulleted listing of expected learning competencies per grade level, and now they want to go high-tech with an antiquated education program? Whoa! So to DepEd, all I can say is, SHOW US YOU CAN MAKE EFFECTIVE CONTENT FIRST, maybe then we can think of going high-tech.

P.S. Did you know that most TV sets with cable the Knowledge Channel donated ended up in the Principal’s offices and not in any multimedia classroom? One time I made a surprise visit to one of these public schools and saw the teachers watching Wowowee in the principal’s office. Amazing.

well, the cyber education project of deped is suspended due to some allegations… tsk..tsk…

The Government is just using the DepEd cyber education project to win the contract. Normal procedure under present government. Do you remember before additional taxes was imposed? They use the teachers or they said it will be added to teachers salary. The additional taxes is there already and a very small additional salary is added too.
Now the Cyber project as part of educational program without planning and goal. That is one good indicator that the goverment is using Education. In reality, DepEd public schools are still not ready for computer and internet. They will waste the people money if this thing continue. Why? teachers specially graduated below 1998 (win98) do not know computer at all. Yet these teachers are now the bosses, supervisors and principal. There should be major quality training to the teachers in all specialization before any Cyber project.

do you agree with this plan? i think it’s rotten. I mean, can’t the DepEd see what’s going on? are they sure every school in the Philippines has electricity? think of our remote areas. hello? what they’re supposed to do is to improve and finish those unfinished projects that they promised before. There are lots of building that are destroyed, unfinished, etc. I know they’re only nuts for them. but if they can’t manipulate a single nut, how much more a ton of elephants?? they are so boastful they are only doing this because they want our country to be like other country to. it’s not bad to imitate them but our government doesn’t have enough fund to suffies the budget that is going to need in this said preoject. I’m sure they only want to approve this project because they want to earn more. it’s big time money, isn’t it? but the money that was earned will not be going to the fund of our country but surely to the pockets of our government officials.

hi jing!

I liked yor comment a lot!! Thanks for the information. Considering the facts and figures you gave. I can say that we are’nt ready for these kinds of implementations.How are we suppose to educate students who are incapable of reading and writing..? The news annouced that literacy rate of the students ranging from grades one to three are low average.How are they suppose to understand what they are watching? One thing that we cannot deny, the uncomfortable learning atmosphere of remote areas and the loss of electricity, these are the things that the department of education should focus more on and not the idea of implementing cyber education. Aside from these problems corruption is a question. We are definetly not sure that all the money that the government gives goes all to the projects it provides.The news now is enough proof that we are surrounded by all types of crimes, what more should we ask for? Although its not strong enough, I think that I made my point.

thank you!!!

jing,

Good daY once again..!

I’d like to add something more at the things I mentioned Earlier. I’m not againsnt the project but all i want to point out is that we should give more importance to the essential needs of each student..
Basically they need books and other reading references.. Our technology today is pretty spicied up with lots of things. We are left out in these terms, the department of education thinking of catching up with the said technology that other countries adapt at wants to implement cyber education which is definitely impractical..Because of the focus they give on technology they somehow forget that there are lots things to consider in doing so because we don’t have the same level of adapting and cooping with things. We should take our step in education in a slow but sure process.

salamat!! weeee!!!

There are so many hullabaloos about this cyber education thing.Why some people in the government sector always make things complicated..the proposed project involves billions of money, still they are so willing to spend for it. While in fact it’s already been a long time that Public School Teachers are facing the basic but one of the biggest problems in Philippine Education- scarcity of Reference Books and related materials (not to mention the minimal salary of the teachers)..yet there’s no plausible action from the government regarding the said matter..

Here’s another thing.. the simplest one.
Students are human being with emotions, no matter how high tech the said project is, it doesn’t have the ability to respond to the student’s emotional welfare…haaayyy..

‘think its right that PGMA cancelled this deal… but still, i thnk our madame president should answer all questions meant for her. as in, walang sagot ‘tong head jk

one more thing…uhm… its good to know we have high budget for our Education, but don’t you thnk 8z over!?Sum pipol dont evn know how to right nor read, and skulz dnt even hav complete materials pro gnyan nah proposal nyoh?pwede step by step lng kac hndi nman to magic eH…comment lng poh,

The issue of DepEd CyberEd Project have vanished already.This is usual in every Philippine scandal after failure to raise people support.

Certainly, there are more problems that DepED need to oversee. This thing contribute to failure to handle quality education. What is that? That is low teachers salary. I friend and intelligent teacher of City Science HS shocked me when he chat me that he is now in Canada. He work now as Network Administrator. Leaving his students with uncertainty.

On the next day, another science high school teacher chat me and told me he is now in USA. We are all leaving the DepEd and Philippines. This teacher is so good in web and data base teaching.Advanced teaching his students produced more IT students.

How many more sci tech teachers will leave they student because of salary?