With over four million enrollees from 2016 to 2021, the Department of Education (DepEd) said that the Alternative Learning System (ALS) has become a very important program under the current administration.
“We are happy that the enrollment rate of the Alternative Learning system has gone up through the years,” Education Secretary Leonor Magtolis Briones said in a statement issued Thursday, May 5.
The ALS program is a parallel learning system that provides opportunities for out-of-school youth and adult (OSYA) learners to “develop basic and functional literacy skills” and to “access equivalent pathways” to complete basic education.
“The ALS is an important legacy of the Duterte Administration,” Briones said. The ALS, she added, was the “first program” that President Duterte “gave his full support and special attention to.”
Briones noted that the numbers have shown that the DepEd has been “putting concerted effort to reach out OSYAs nationwide and give them a chance to have a diploma in all basic education levels.”
Higher than the past two admins
Meanwhile, DepEd Assistant Secretary for Alternative Learning System G.H. Ambat reported that the enrollment numbers during the current administration are “80.32 percent higher than the past two administrations on a yearly average.”
Significant developments
To provide more opportunities to the OSYAs to elevate their professional careers in the long run, DepEd also highlighted that 288 public schools and two private schools from 10 regions are now implementing the ALS-Senior High School program.
In 2019, DepEd Region V launched the pilot implementation of the ALS-SHS program in four schools, wherein after two years, 62 learners were able to complete the course and obtain their diplomas.
It was also noted that through the partnership with UNESCO Jakarta and Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) Philippines, the country developed and launched the new K-to-12 aligned learning modules.
The said project will address the need to develop 21st-century skills among its learners and bridge the gap in updated learning resources for ALS learners in the next few years.
DepEd also emphasized the improvement of the passers for the Presentation Portfolio Assessment (PPA), where 71.42 percent of qualifiers from School Year 2019-2020 passed the said assessment while 87.55 percent were able to pass in School Year 2020-2021 for Elementary Level.
On the other hand, DepEd noted that 83.56 percent of the qualifiers from the School Year 2019-2022 succeeded in the PPA while 93.51 percent of qualifiers from School Year 2020-2021 received their certificate in the Junior High School Level.
In December 2020, Duterte also signed Republic Act No. 11510 institutionalizing the ALS program and creating the Bureau of Alternative Learning System (BALS), which will ensure that no learners are left behind by providing a parallel learning system for non-formal education.
Briones, on behalf of DepEd, extended its gratitude to its partners in the legislature for “championing the right of every Filipino to quality basic education, whether through formal or non-formal means of instruction.”