Sen. Nancy Binay doubts that public school teachers are ready to teach their students via online when classes starts on Oct. 5 due to the lack of faster Internet connectivity in the Philippines.
With the Internet speed in the Philippine’s not still comparable to other neighboring countries, Binay said she expects conducting online classes would be difficult for most of the country’s public school teachers.
“I raised that during a (Senate) hearing with the Department of Education (DepEd) because right now local government units (LGUs) and even private companies are trying to raise funds to buy gadgets for the teachers and students, but if there is no connectivity, the concept of face-to-face learning through technology is still elusive,” Binay said in an interview over Radio DZRH Sunday.
The senator said she believes public school teachers would only be able to carry out a combination of teaching modules using printed materials and television (TV) programs to teach students.
“I think in the first three months, online teaching would be a least priority, also because of lack of gadgets. Also, not all teachers also have their own laptop or tablets,” Binay lamented.
Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) Secretary Gringo Honasan II had earlier said the Internet speed in the Philippines “is not doing too badly” compared to other countries, despite the fact that Internet speed in the country is three to seven megabits per second, compared to the 55 Mbps speed of some countries.
While she may somewhat agree to Honasan’s estimate, she said she still believes that the WiFi connectivity services in the Philippines, until now, lags behind its neighbors in Asia.
“That’s why I believe having a third telco (telecommunication company) would be beneficial to us,” she said.