After getting approval from the Commission on Higher Education (CHED), the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) is now offering the Master of Arts in Education major in Teaching in Challenged Areas (MAED-TCA).

Starting October 2021, MAED-TCA is currently being offered by PUP as a new program offering for the first semester of school year 2021-2022 according to PUP Office for Teaching and Learning Development Director Ma. Junithesmer Rosales.

The MAED-TCA recently opened by PUP is program is under the College of Education Graduate Studies at the PUP main campus in Sta. Mesa, Manila.

“MAED-TCA is a first of its kind in the country and it hopes to attract local and foreign students who are interested in exploring the contexts of teaching in challenged areas,” Rosales said.

CHED approved the offering of the program in February 2021 for three universities within the Project FORTH consortium or the “Formation of Teachers in Emerging Challenged Areas in the Philippines.”

Project FORTH is an Erasmus Plus capacity-building project, co-funded by the European Commission.

One of the major deliverables of said project is the offering of MAED-TCA.

Apart from PUP, West Visayas State University has also started offering the program. University of Saint La Salle in Bacolod will offer it in the next school year.

Rosales said the MAED-TCA curriculum has six courses of three credits each for the major or 18 units which includes: 1) Understanding the Context of Challenged Areas, 2) Profile of a Teacher Marginalized Areas, 3) Creating an Inviting and Workable Learning Climate in Challenged Areas, 4) Teaching, Learning and Assessment in Challenged Areas, 5) Creation of Relevant and Appropriate Teaching Materials for Challenged Areas, and 6) Creating a Collegial Teaching and Learning Community Reaching out to a Global Reality.

Rosales said that students who will be taking up the MAED-TCA have to “complete a six-unit thesis, nine units of foundation courses (Foundations of Education, Statistics, and Methods of Research).”

Additionally, Rosales explained that students “need to complete a three- unit elective on any of the following courses: Education for Peace, Foundations of Special Education, Mental Hygiene, or Psychology of the Reading Process.” Rosales said that the faculty members of the program, who are holders of relevant doctorate degrees, are composed of local and international education experts.

“They have completed the six modules as well as three training-workshops conducted by the project for a period of three years from 2019-2021,” Rosales added.

Rosales noted that teachers from the cluster institutions helped in crafting the curriculum of the new major “through face-to-face collaborations, online meetings, inter-island and continental trainings to explore various aspects of the challenges through a collegial and synergistic experience.”

Aside from PUP, four other distinguished Philippine universities including West Visayas State University, University of Southeastern Philippines, University of Saint La Salle in Bacolod, and Centro Escolar University and three renowned universities in Europe which include University of Bologna in Italy, University of Groningen in Netherlands, and University of Deusto in Spain partnered with SEAMEO-Innotech, Philippine Association for Teachers and Educators (PAFTE), CHED, NGOs like the Intered and Teresian Association International, Inc., and the Department of Education (DepEd) also collaborated in crafting the curriculum.