Ligao City in Albay province implemented the Text2Teach program across all its elementary schools, becoming the first city to do so. The program provides educational videos and materials to students using mobile phones and TV screens. The city's former mayor spearheaded the program to improve education quality. The Department of Education also fully supported the program and helped with training teachers and monitoring implementation in schools. Stakeholders across the local community, including local governments, parents, and teachers have also been involved to help ensure the program's success in providing education to students.
Ligao City in Albay province implemented the Text2Teach program across all its elementary schools, becoming the first city to do so. The program provides educational videos and materials to students using mobile phones and TV screens. The city's former mayor spearheaded the program to improve education quality. The Department of Education also fully supported the program and helped with training teachers and monitoring implementation in schools. Stakeholders across the local community, including local governments, parents, and teachers have also been involved to help ensure the program's success in providing education to students.
Original Description:
Case Story for Ayala Foundation Text2Teach Program's 10th Year Anniversary
Original Title
Ligao City, Albay: The Text2Teach city that loves to learn
Ligao City in Albay province implemented the Text2Teach program across all its elementary schools, becoming the first city to do so. The program provides educational videos and materials to students using mobile phones and TV screens. The city's former mayor spearheaded the program to improve education quality. The Department of Education also fully supported the program and helped with training teachers and monitoring implementation in schools. Stakeholders across the local community, including local governments, parents, and teachers have also been involved to help ensure the program's success in providing education to students.
Ligao City in Albay province implemented the Text2Teach program across all its elementary schools, becoming the first city to do so. The program provides educational videos and materials to students using mobile phones and TV screens. The city's former mayor spearheaded the program to improve education quality. The Department of Education also fully supported the program and helped with training teachers and monitoring implementation in schools. Stakeholders across the local community, including local governments, parents, and teachers have also been involved to help ensure the program's success in providing education to students.
For a minute, Ligao City in the Province of Albay, will get you fooled. It does not look like a metropolis as one would assume a city to be, what with its hectares of coconut trees and spread across picturesque fields dotted with humbly-built houses. Even the city center seems more like a small town with one fast food chain and a local mall that looks more like a community arcade. No high rises here. Yet, Ligao has gained cityhood status since March 2001, after a plebiscite where 1,387 no votes could not compete with 17,753 yeses, and this has served its population of 105,000 well.
Local Government Vision
Ligao Citys former Mayor Linda Gonzales, after ensuring farm to market roads for the predominantly agricultural territory in her first terms, focused on providing quality education for all in her last. Her administration spearheaded the I Love to Learn Program which aimed at facilitating the delivery of quality education in all schools by providing necessary infrastructure, equipment, complementary teacher training, and a daily supplementary feeding program for all pupils, which everyone likes to talk about, beaming. The cityhood also meant that the Department of Education had to set up a division for Ligao alone and that provided for a separate budget, its own plantilla staff, and more autonomy.
These conditions made it ripe for significant improvements to happen in the city in terms of education. In 2010, the City of Ligao, Department of Education (DepEd) Division of Ligao City and Ayala Foundation, Inc. (AFI), along with other partners, entered into agreement to implement the Text2Teach program. This started out of informal talks between Mayor Gonzales, an AFI officer implementing the Gearing Up Internet Literacy and Access for Students (GILAS) Program in Ligao, and the DepEds ICT Coordinator. GILAS had been providing internet laboratories to public high schools in Ligao and in the country and Mayor Gonzales wanted to extend ICT-assisted education to primary education. As counterpart, the City of Ligao provided Php 738,000 to the program which covered teacher training and the 29-inch TV sets that connected to the Nokia mobile phones containing the Nokia Education Delivery (NED) materials.
Initially, teachers from 24 schools were trained in the Text2Teach program. After conducting preliminary monitoring and evaluation, the city went on to train teachers from the remaining 25 schools. As early as 2012, 100% of the elementary schools in Ligao City were already implementing Text2Teach, an achievement then unparalleled by any city or municipality.
Moreover, Ligao City is the only Text2Teach site wherein the LGU allocates funds annually for upgrades, maintenance, complementary projects, and other enhancements for the Text2Teach program.
DepEd Direction
It is one thing to get the program off the ground and it is quite another to get it going. In Ligao, while the former Mayor was instrumental in spearheading Text2Teach, DepEd helped make sure that Text2Teach was maximized and used well in the schools, as part of their mandate and commitment to the program.
According to Division Superintendent Evangeline Palencia, Text2Teach is aligned with the national learning strategy which is why they had no doubts about pushing it in their locality. The Basic Education Sector Reform Agenda (BESRA), and the ICT4D and Literacy thrusts of National DepEd provide the legal basis for Text2Teach. These assure the Division DepEd that they are moving in the right direction by implementing the program.
Since its first implementation in Ligao, Text2Teach has been part of the action plans presented by the Division Superintendent at the State of the Schools Address done at the end of the school year. This is the venue wherein the Division Superintendent presents accomplishments of the division to school heads and the action plans for the next year. She cascades memos annually to the school heads to institutionalize the implementation of Text2Teach. Staff meetings are conducted regularly in the division office, and there updates on Text2Teach are presented. Furthermore, all school heads are required to attend the regular Management Committee, cluster, division, and curriculum meetings where they discuss about various education issues and projects, including Text2Teach.
If Palencia provides the overall direction of Text2Teach in the division, the ICT Coordinator, Joy Navera is the go-to-person, liaising among the Superintendent, the schools, and Ayala Foundation, regarding all Text2Teach concerns. For her part, Navera conducted two focus group discussions with the Text2Teach teachers which surfaced concerns on sharing of Text2Teach phone and scheduling of classes, among other implementation concerns. These FGDs were convened after each Text2Teach training, where teachers would express questions about using the technology. Navera also created a monitoring tool for DepEd schools in the city which checked on equipment, video content, and other concerns. According to school heads and teachers, aside from Naveras monitoring visits, they appreciate that how she makes herself available for any concerns and questions that they may have.
Noteworthy is how Navera took the helm, along with the first batch of Text2Teach teachers, to train the second batch of teachers on the program. Navera has also been asked by Ayala Foundation numerous times, to speak during its events and to comment on the video materials as they were being refined.
Aside from the BESRA and the ICT4D and Literacy thrusts of the DepEd, Text2Teach is also connected to its School Based Management (SBM) program. The SBM is a framework of governance adopted by DepEd in 2001 which decentralizes authority and resources to the school level with the assumption that school heads, teachers, community leaders, and parents are more attuned to the needs and possible responses of pupils in their locality. They are mandated to decide on education-related issues such as budget, personnel, and the curriculum.
In Ligao City, with the promotion of the LGU and recommendation of the division, all schools opted to institutionalize Text2Teach in their teaching and planning. Text2Teach is included in the School Improvement Plans (SIP), School Development Plans (SDP) and also in the teachers class program. Maricel Corcuera, Grade 6 teacher and Text2Teach coordinator in Palapas Elementary School, noted that reception of teachers and students on Text2Teach was good because most students in Ligao have already been exposed to technological advancements like TVs, phones, and laptops. Using these gadgets during classes was a welcome change.
Whereas the division sets and supervises the implementation of Text2Teach, it is the schools that run the show. School heads and teachers set up the computer rooms, raise funds to provide other needs such as seats, tables, and TV stands to facilitate instruction. They decide on scheduling of Text2Teach classes and when to use which NED material. Some Text2Teach schools take the liberty to have their malfunctioning devices repaired or accessories replaced. For more complex problems which cannot be solved locally, schools turn to the ICT Coordinator or the Text2Teach helpdesk. These show the schools initiative as well as ownership of the project.
Multi-stakeholder Involvement
The school head and teachers commitment in using Text2Teach defines the implementation of the project. Often, their diligence in involving other stakeholders spells the difference between mere usage and successful institutionalization.
In Ligao City, the school heads normally engage the barangay (village) LGU especially in providing added security (gates, fences, assigning a barangay tanod or a night watchman) to safeguard the equipments of Text2Teach. Of the five schools represented in the interviews for this case study, none had experienced any thefts so far. `
Certain amounts are allotted per year from the barangay LGU budget to fund the schools identified needs such as gates, fences, pump wells, toilets, grills, repainting activities, trash bins, etc. Some barangays, Tandarura, for example, go as far as shouldering electricity expenses of schools especially since there had been recent electricity issues in far-flung communities.
According to the barangay captains interviewed, the barangays can also easily go to the Mayor for help which they themselves cannot extend to the schools. Aside from the Barangay, the Parent- Teachers Association (PTA) is very active in ensuring that school operations flow as smoothly as possible. The PTA is especially very active during DepEds Brigada Eskuwela, a preparatory process for all elementary schools before a school year starts. They also organize tree planting activities, jamborees, sporting events, and participate daily in the citys feeding program. That the parents meet regularly formally and informally is beneficial because this gives them the chance to talk about students concerns including Text2Teach.
The school PTA collect dues from members which range from Php 50 to 150. The funds are used for PTA projects which involve repairs and purchase of equipment, repairs of school facilities, and repainting of classrooms. Some PTA also contribute to the electricity and water bills of the schools and one schools PTA (Pandan Elementary School), pays for half the salary of the guard on duty. The PTA and some student councils occasionally organize income-generating programs such as school pageants and raffle draws to purchase equipment such as TVs, air conditioning for the computer room, and other items. The LGU and schools can depend on the PTA for community counterparts, including those needed for the sustainability of implementation of Text2Teach.
Teachers in Ligao West Central Elementary School (LWCES) Binatagan said, Parents are impressed by Text2Teach so they are motivated to donate more. At first, they thought that the project is a luxury. But it turned out okay. As long as it benefits the pupils, the PTA is willing to give.
Two schools have an alumni association that occasionally can be tapped for pet projects such as installing pavements and hosting student contests. Some PTAs/schools solicit donation from Ligaenos residing or working abroad.
All these activities successfully maintain collaborative environment and a system which make it easy for Text2Teach to be implemented and for children to learn because equipments and classrooms are maintained, security is provided, and teachers can concentrate on their lessons and on using teaching aids such as Text2Teach to facilitate learning.
Interpersonal Relationships In theory, it is easy to implement a program: craft a memorandum of agreement, allot a budget, and make sure everyone does his or her job. In reality, ensuring that everyone does his or her job is tricky. Ligao City is fortunate enough that the motivations, management style, and work ethic of the stakeholders involve mesh well.
Good education for all Ligaenos, and enhancement of literacy through technology advancement have been the personal advocacies of all key stakeholders. This was crucial to the success of Text2Teach in Ligao. LGU and DepEd officials are forward-looking and progressive and believe in harnessing technology to enhance teaching and learning in a non-conventional way. Education is deemed very important because productivity and an elevated Ligao culture are tied to it.
The key players have an affinity to the place. Aside from Mayor Gonzales who was lauded as bringing progressive projects to the city, ICT Coordinator Navera is also from Ligao and feels it is her duty to do whatever she can in the development of the City and Bicol culture. Palencia is not from Ligao but feels a strong sense of kinship with the people. She stresses to her staff that they should do all they can to help their city prosper.
The stakeholders were candid enough to say that they had also personal pragmatic motivations for being wholeheartedly involved with Text2Teach. For Palencia, having Text2Teach would definitely help them increase the NAT ranking of the whole division and she would happy if this would be her legacy. Navera also said she had learned a lot and enjoyed a bigger sphere of influence while being assigned to Text2Teach. In an interview, she said, I would be lying if I did not think that being active in Text2Teach would promote my professional growth. But at the end of the day, if youre a teacher, youre a teacher. You gain a sense of fulfilment if you see that learning is translated in others, and youre happy with that.
Navera said that it is connecting the dots and reading between the lines which is needed to make the program work. Stakeholders saw Text2Teach as a means to bigger ends: quality education for children in Ligao; and personal ends: competence-building, professional leverage, personal fulfilment.
Mayor Gonzales was steadfast in her vision of educating the whole city not disregarding the primary level. She used her networking abilities to bring development partners in the city and maintained good relations with them by prioritizing their projects in terms of allocating resources and being active in various promotion activities. She was also hands-on in making sure that things went smoothly. In fact, Barangay Captains and school heads who were interviewed for this case study related how the Mayor would usually informally check on them whether there were any problems regarding Text2Teach and would then order the necessary adjustments.
Coincidentally, Navera was also very close to Mayor Gonzales because both are members of the Womens League. They talk and agree on matters informally; letters are only drafted as formality measures. This expedites decision-making and ensures that kinks about the project are smoothened immediately.
Palencia, the DepEd Superintendent is very supportive of Navera and inclusive of other supervisors. She promotes generalization, not specialization, meaning, everybody should know about Text2Teach and include it in their monitoring activities. Her staff appreciates that she is not a micro- manager and allows them to own the program and be creative in their implementation. A motherly figure, she has a knack for ensuring a conducive working environment in her division, evident in her finding ways to put up a new and well-equipped DepEd office building in Ligao. This makes it easy for everyone to be efficient and professional in their work.
There is good coordination between Navera and the school heads as evidence by the latters warm accommodation during the research visits. The school heads and teachers said that they liked the not-too-formal set-up and prompt response as regards Naveras monitoring rounds and text correspondences. They also say that the Division Superintendent has always made herself accessible to all school heads.
In the school level, the school heads and teachers seem to also have a strong working relationship. The teachers are in charge of coordinating the use of Text2Teach materials and equipments and the school heads facilitate these by seeing to it that the lesson plans are tight and the equipment are in proper working order. As mentioned, the barangay and the PTA are included in the school system as support organizations that make the teachers jobs easier.
All the key stakeholders, especially the ICT coordinator, have been generous in ideas and service, often going beyond call of duty. There is an attitude of excellence among key players. If opportunities like Text2Teach present themselves, there is no reason not to pursue them.
If I can push things to do more, I will, shared Navera.
AFI Implementation All stakeholders in Ligao City identified AFIs assistance to be crucial in their success also. First, without the budget granted to them, Text2Teach would not have happened at all. Second, AFI was very persuasive in advocating for Text2Teach. And since the Mayor and the DepEd Division Office already had a working relationship with AFI with the GILAS Project and other issues concerning education, it was not difficult for them to commit to Text2Teach.
It also comes with the prestige, Navera said. Partnering with AFI makes LCEs and DepEd proud to be associated with such a well-reputed organization. More importantly, AFI is seen by all stakeholders, even at the school level, to be sincere in its vision, mission, and objective. Palencia said that it was important that they dealt with an organization which they could trust because their names were also on the line. If there is inkling that stakeholders are only it for political reasons, she says, others will know this and will not be very interested or involved.
Stakeholders appreciate that AFI is very approachable and quick to respond to t heir concerns. They had no hesitations. They did not leave us, Navera said. This made it more appealing for the LGU to coordinate and partner with them continuously. Because they were fast, the Mayors interest was sustained, she further explained.
Creating Ripples of Success
The perceived benefits and positive impacts of Text2Teach on the students are what motivate all parties to engage in Text2Teach. They see the program as effective in obtaining and sustaining the attention of the students and enhancing learning among them. In fact, schools attest that since Text2Teach was implemented, they have experienced increased NAT scores and more academic student awards and citations such as in Math meets, Science quiz bees, and District/Division/Regional Press Conferences. Some schools have received external awards and were given grants such as Books for the Barrios Model of Excellence that gave them more opportunities to improve their facilities. Because of the Text2Teach, the LGU and Mayor Gonzales also received numerous excellence citations and governance awards which made Ligaoenos proud. Additionally, Ligao was featured in a Readers Digest article involving innovative educational practices in the world.
According to the stakeholders, awards and citations and the proper and enthusiastic implementation of Text2Teach are a cycle. Returns of investment to the LGU and the Division encourage them to do better. At the school level, each academic contest in which a pupil wins encourages them to use all the learning tools, including Text2Teach more in order to perform well each time. As such, they identify the need to celebrate victories as a marketing tool to rally support for the project.
Also, the Text2Teach success in Ligao opened opportunities for other projects and interactions. Stakeholder are now used to partnering with each other through the Text2Teach experience, Its easier now to solicit help, a teacher said. For example, LWCES Binatagan won a Brigada Eskuwela Excellence Awards (Most exceptional category) in 2012. They attribute this to the way different sectors collaborated during the period. The Supreme Pupil Government played a crucial role in involving the PTA, Philippine National Police, Philippine Army, private businesses (a salon provided free haircut to all students and teachers), local fraternities, churches such as the Iglesia ni Kristo, Church of the Latter Day Saints, and other stakeholders. It is said that a total of Php 2 million was used during the said period to improve the school. This includes the new buildings set-up by DepEd and other stakeholders in the school compound.
Future Directions
In 2013, the Philippine General elections ushered in a new Mayor in Ligao. The young Patty Gonzales-Alsua replaced Mayor Gonzales who had finished her last term. The ICT Coordinator and Division Superintendent are currently adjusting to new administration. Because Mayor Alsua is new, the manner of coordination is not the same, but parties maintain respect and openness to each other.
The new Mayor stresses that she is supportive of education sector as well as Text2Teach. She said that the local government of Ligao considers DepEd as part of the LGU family and because Text2Teach has proven to be successful in the past years, her new administration has no reason not to support the program. We wouldnt support it if it were not effective, Mayor Alsua said.
Mayor Alsua explained that Text2Teach support is embedded in the expenditure allocation of the City. For 2014 budget, Php 500,000 is earmarked for Text2Teach. This is reassuring as more support is needed to train six new extension schools on Text2Teach in an expanding city and to ensure that all schools continue to use program and adjust to fast-paced trends in the ICT sector.
Summary
The Ligao Case shows that LGU initiative and commitment, DepEd support, the networking abilities of the school principals and teachers, an empowered barangay, PTA, and great working relationship among different stakeholders are the ingredients to a successful Text2Teach implementation. Good AFI management and awards and citations keep the ball rolling and motivate the stakeholders to keep using the technology and to network among other stakeholders for the improvement of local school systems.
This article is written by Diana Moraleda. The data gathering for this case were conducted in February to March 2014. Ligao City, as one of the most successful cases of Text2Teach implementation, also became of the bases for the mainstreaming model that Text2Teach is using as it transitions into its mainstreaming and scaling up phase.