THE CYBER EDUCATION

PROJECT

Irene T. MañovaMAT-THE

It was conceptualized during the time of President Fidel V. Ramos. The idea was to use the country’s Agila satellite system which was launched into orbit in 1997, as the tool. However, it didn’t push through.

During President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s government, is trying hard in realizing this development amidst the strong and challenging political and economic concerns.

ACADEMIC PERFORMANCELow mastery levels in both Elementary and Secondary levels

Lowest grades are in Science and Math

Poor performance in international benchmark exam

DROP-OUTS: HIGH RISK IN COHORT SURVIVAL

Only 7 out of 10 pupils entering Grade 1 will finish grade VI

Only 4 will finish secondary schoolingReasons for dropping out include lack

of pre-school preparation, disinterest in the lessons, poverty, malnutrition and transportation problem.

OUT-OF-SCHOOL YOUTHFUNCTIONAL ILLITERATES – 9.16 million

around 16% of the population are illiterate youths and adults

VS. Mobile Teachers - 800VS. Alternative Learning – 0.17% of DepEd

Budget

Impossible to reach the illiterate youths and adults without the aid of electronic multi-media technology

Reach the illiterate youths and adults with the aid of electronic multimedia technology. Better yet, use a satellite technology that connects all schools in real time so that contents and processes are standardized.

The Best response to the challenges of basic education is the CYBER EDUCATION PROJECT. It is the quickest and most-effective way of delivering the same high quality education to all learners throughout the country.

CYBER EDUCATION is defined as brand new form of education in which instructional and management activities are carried out mainly based on E-Learning technologies.

It includes concepts like “online education”, “E-Learning”, “virtual education”, “digital education”, “multimedia learning” and among others.

The Philippines’ Cyber Education Project is accurately described as a SATELLITE-BASED DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAM.

This ICT-based education strategy is included in an economic cooperation agreement between the Philippines and China signed in June 2006. The CEP is supposed to be carried out with technical assistance from Tsinghua University, China’s premier technology university and one of the world’s pioneers in distance education.

The DepEd set the school year 2008-2009 as the target date for the launch of the pilot schools and the remaining schools for the first phase of CEP.

However, allegations that the CEP is another anomalous transaction similar to the controversial $329 M national broadband network (NBN) project.

September 25, 2007: President Arroyo officially announces the suspension of the NBN and CyberEd projects. “ We have suspended the national broadband and cyber education projects in response to political criticisms, “ she said.

Under CEP, a total of 37,794 schools will be linked to a nationwide network that provides 12 video channels (one channel for each grade/year level and a channel for teacher training), wireless wide area networking, local area networking and wireless internet connectivity that is expected to be finished in 3 years. The network will enable collaboration among teachers and will introduce school children to more interactive and interesting learning methodologies.

The CEP will make use of satellite technology since satellite communications do not demand extensive wire infrastructure in order to broadcast information. Classrooms will be equipped with a television set hooked to a satellite disc. At the start of a subject period, the teacher opens the TV to receive a live satellite feed from DepEd studios in Manila. A “master teacher” gives a live lecture simultaneously to tens of thousands of students all over the country.

DepEd is planning to get the “best” teachers including Metrobank awardees to act as speakers or trainers for the live broadcast. The teacher and students will watch the live lecture, and then spend the rest of the subject period discussing and doing school work.

To implement aforementioned strategy, the Deped will install the necessary equipment, which include TVs and computers, in about 34 schools per day for three years, starting with schools in 3rd class cities and municipalities. Also, the DepEd will put up its own studio and broadcasting center to produce the daily live shows on 12 channels covering five subjects.

A dedicated network that will eventually connect all DepEd administrative units in the country including:

A nationwide network that will utilize satellite technology considered to be most effective and efficient in the world today.

Central office 17 regional offices 187 division ICT

offices All public schools

NETWORK NETWORK CONFIGURATIONCONFIGURATION

Source:

• This network configuration is a proven design for other satellite-based distance education programs in other countries.

• The central office will house the master production center. This includes the data centers, network operating center and satellite communications center. Everything that can be achieved in the network will go through the highly secure master production center

• Model schools will house the virtual classroom studios which will broadcast live classes to all recipient schools nationwide.

• Regional office has the capability to produce localized content and upload it to the network for use of everybody

• Central, Regional and division offices have the capability for video conferencing and high-speed file sharing

• Schools will have own Local Area Network (LAN) and logistical preparation.

PROJECTPROJECT CONNECTIVITYCONNECTIVITY

Source:

• Multimedia classroom contains an average of 2 PCs, 4 TVs, 1 printer, 1 set of send/receive antenna

• Each school will have a local media server that will manage all materials downloaded from the data centers

• There is virtually no limit to the number of additional TVs and PCs that the intranet can accommodate

• The use of television is a strategy to ease the transition to more sophisticated forms of technology and reduce technophobia, especially in elementary schools. Teachers and students might still be comfortable in using TVs for learning in the early stages of project implementation.

PROJECTPROJECT CONNECTIVITYCONNECTIVITY

• There is no limit to the number of TVs the network can accommodate

• The presence of a few computers will gradually make them more comfortable in utilizing the technology. In the future, as computer prices decrease and more donors / private sector partners support DepED, computer density in schools will eventually increase and pave the way for more independent forms of pedagogy

• Outsiders to the network can visit a website where they can download other multimedia content.

PROJECTPROJECT CONNECTIVITYCONNECTIVITY

United States, Canada, Chile, Mexico, El Salvador, Panama, Guatemala, Honduras, Thailand, Indonesia, India and China.

The CEP project is patterned after the successful China Education and Research Network (CERNET), which serves 320 M school children, and the E-Education Project, which provides about the same Cyber Ed package to almost 500 000 schools and universities in China.

China’s Tsinghua University as the major partner to lead in the turn-key setup. Best Technology university in China (no. 17 in the

world) Pioneered the long-distance education platform for

China Manages the Chinese CERNET Backbone (320 M

beneficiaries) Runs E-education project for almost 500,000 schools Has cutting edge Live Interactive Class Software Has extensive Courseware Development Experience

Improving the teaching-learning process 15-20 minutes daily live broadcast of lectures delivered

by excellent master teachers to ensure accuracy of content by reducing/avoiding teacher misconceptions and textbook errors

This provides a national standard for pacing of lessons. Schools will know whether they are advanced or lagging in their lessons and react accordingly.

This ensures the quality of education received by all. They can easily be referenced either through the Intranet or

through internet. To reach 9 M illiterate youths and adults, who according to

DepEd, are impossible to reach without the aid of multimedia technology.

Frequent In-school “virtual” Training from certified experts

Unlimited access to professional development materials

Country-wide collaborative learning and courseware development (learning from each other)

Efficient Management Information System• Data & reports will be received faster, monitoring can be

done even without leaving the office and issue/problems can be addressed almost immediately.

Cost-Effective monitoring and Internal Control system• School-based management can be strengthened and

tighter internal control can be enforces. Empowerment and decentralization through

connectivity• Interconnectivity of all DepEd units will open new doors not

just for pedagogy and training, but for general management of schools and entire bureaucracy.

Total School Beneficiaries: 37,794 Outside 1st and 2nd class cities

Total schools with satellite-based facilities: 26,618Elementary Schools: 22,855 (62%) Secondary Schools: 3,763 (77%)

Additional 30% of elementary schools through clustering

90% of all public elementary and secondary

schools stand to benefit from the project.

Serving at least 13 MILLION students

and 800 classes for OUT-OF-SCHOOL youth

Source:

INITIAL PROJECT INVESTMENT (Year 1)

$100M Chinese ODA + GOP Counterpart = PhP5.8B

CYBER ED COST PER PUPIL

Php1.22 per day

INTERNET CAFÉ COST

(unguided learning) PhP

15.00 per hour

VS.

Source:

TOTAL INVESTMENT (over 5 years)

PhP 26.48 billion

•Phase 1: $100M•Phase 2: $200 M•Phase 3: $150 M

Equipment for Schools

68.57%Equipment

for backbone2.30%

Courseware Training Quality

Assurance2.20%

Operating Cost

12.66%

Duties and Taxes10.97%

Inflation3.30%

Source:

TOTAL PROJECT INVESTMENTPhP26.48B5-YEAR AVERAGE

YEARLY COVERAGE13.6 Million

Students

5-YEARPER STUDENT

COSTPER DAY

64 CENTAVOS

Source:

The CEP is the largest among five contracts entered into by the Philippines government with China costing a total of US$ 465.5 M or P26.48 B. The project was sealed by Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) signed by the GOP thru the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Secretary Peter Favila and Dr. Jung of Tsinghua Tongfang Nuctech Co. of China.

86% of the total project cost will be funded via a loan from the Chinese government while the remaining 14% will come form the GOP national treasury.

Bulk of the project cost 68.7% will be used for the purchase of equipment while the remainder will be distributes as follows: 12.66% - operating

cost 10% - taxes and duties 3.30% - inflation

2.3% - equipment backbone

2.2% courseware training and quality assurance.

In the analysis of the NBN and the CEP, UP professors Raul Fabella and Emmanuel De Dios described how in some inexplicable twist, the CEP was scaled up to entail a government operated backbone which consequently amplified its cost to P26.48 billion from its original no-separate backbone project estimate of 5.2 billion.

The same study criticized the project’s lack of an economic rationale.

To emphasize the magnitude of cost of the project, the P26.48 billion pesos could build 48,145 classrooms at P550, 000.00 per classroom.

The installation of computers and televisions including network connectivity in 26, 618 public schools within 3 years by some 40 teams or around 1 school per team per day leaves little room for error. However, logistics itself would already prove to be troublesome given the actual locations of schools all over the country.

Given the number of teachers and students, will everyone be able to use the computers to download lessons and learning materials?

The World Bank also says that it is unclear where to place the computers to make sure they are used most efficiently.

The courseware to be used is an equally important component in the project which must be developed using the Philippines’ own curriculum in a particular subject area. The development and production of each episode required close coordination between curriculum experts, subject area specialist, and production staff. Every episode had to undergo formative evaluation and pretesting with teachers.

As the CEP will use computers to provide real time interaction, it is necessary that training be conducted to the teachers and students who will be using the software and the hardware. DepEd claims that out of 343, 628 nationally funded secondary public teachers, 75,000 already received ICT training under INTEL while 18,000 received training from Microsoft.

DepEd Secretary Jesli Lapus said that the Cyber Ed Project would partially solve the shortage in books and teachers.

Director Lorenzo Mateo, who manages the cyber Education Project, said that the Cyber Ed is the answer to the problems of lack of learning and instructional materials for students and costly teacher training. Also a solution to the late transmission to remote areas of new policies and memorandums.

Mr. Conrado R. Banal III wrote at the Philippine Inquirer that “ the project would use technology to save our education system , which our neighbors have been using for more than 10 years .”

“The cyber education project of DepEd will dramatically improve the delivery of quality basic education through ICT to thousands of public schools in remote barangays”,

Former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo

The alliance of Concerned Teachers provided specific details and situations to refute DepEd’s Claim:

• No studies on effectivity of live TV-based instruction in basic education

• Real school situation: District, Sarangani School, 879 students, 27 teachers, 10 classrooms, 268 desk/chairs 1:32 teacher-pupil ration 3.28 pupil seating ration– 1 TV every 219 students impossible to provide for all grade levels simultaneously clustering scheme to pad the figures if implemented.

• No mention whatsoever of maintenance cost• There’s no MOOE (maintenace and operations funds)

to keep it running.

• Over price• It fails to address the roots of the problems in

basic education• It lacks of transparency

Martin Perez, an educator, had this reminder: a school is not just a building, with rooms full of books and chairs. It is also an integral part of a community, especially in rural areas. Local government units must sustain communities where children stay in school. There must be water, electricity and food. The mere fact that a lot of schools in our country lack these most basic necessities raises the question of how responsive, practical and responsible CEP can be

SCRAP CYBER EDUCATION PROJECT – ANGARA Sen. Edgardo J. Angara said that more than 26

billion allocated for the cyber Education Project of the DepEd should be used to build classrooms, ease the shortage of teachers, desks and textbooks instead of wasting money on a “cyber white elephant.”

Education is a long term play with no quick fixes. ICT is only a tool and cannot fix bad educational philosophy or compensate for bad practice. It is about the way we structure learning and how we manage schooling. It is about managing quality outcomes first and foremost.

The SEPO Policy Brief