The DepEd Commons, the online learning platform of the Department of Education (DepEd), has now over 12 million unique users - making the learning materials more accessible to learners and teachers amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.
During an online presser in Negros Oriental for “EduAKSYON: Aksyon at Solusyon para sa Edukasyon” livestreamed via DepEd Philippines on Monday, March 22, DepEd Undersecretary for Administration Alain Del Pascua said that the significant increase in the number of DepEd Commons users was recorded after the virtual In-Service Training (INSET) concluded last week.
With over 400,000 teacher attendees during the virtual INSET, Pascua said there was a “big jump” in terms of the number of unique users for DepEd Commons because it was one of the topics discussed during the training.
“This only proves the effectiveness of the virtual training because many teachers were trained on using DepEd Commons and the Open Educational Resources (OERs),” Pascua explained in a mix of English and Filipino. “And we saw the big jump in numbers and it is still climbing as of this time,” he added.
Pascua noted that the DepEd Commons - which was launched in 2020 - has more than 9.6 million unique users nationwide before the conduct of the 2021 virtual INSET on March 15 to 19.
Meanwhile, Pascua assured that DepEd is still eyeing to expand the features of DepEd Commons, including certification of teachers, legal vetting, curation, and rating of content.
“DepEd Commons will continue to be relevant as another phase in the pandemic with vaccinations comes in, as well as the talks of the resumptions of face-to-face classes in the future,” he added.
The DepEd Commons (commons.deped.gov.ph) can be accessed free of data charge in cooperation with the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), National Telecommunications Commission (NTC), Smart, and Globe.