Alliance for Mindanao Off-grid Renewable Energy Program

SINCE October 2009, Elizalde Paracueles has been serving as a mobile teacher for the Alternative Learning System (ALS) in Marilog district, a job that does not confine him to a particular school, unlike most of his colleagues.

The 28-year-old Cebuano has been given assignments that have taken him to the remotest schools in the district.

Zalde has always been passionate about teaching, but lack of work opportunities had made him decide to look at other options too.

But his passion for teaching did not wane. After realizing that teaching was his true calling, he left his job at the mall and went on to become a teacher at a private school. Wanting to further spread his wings, he resigned from the private school and volunteered at a public school in Matina.

After finishing his stint as a volunteer kindergarten teacher, Zalde finally found the job he thought would allow him to play a vital role in the education of his people -- as a mobile teacher for the alternative learning system in Marilog district.

The Alternative Learning System is a free education program by the Department of Education, which offers an alternative method of learning to the existing formal education instruction. The program covers both formal and informal education, and targets those that did not have the chance to go through the formal education structure.

A non-grade module-based learning system, students under the Alternative Learning System come in at a set time, and read and discuss the day's module. They do that for a period of ten months or a total of 800 hours, after which students take the Accreditation and Equivalency Test (AET), which, if they pass, will give them a high school diploma.

As ALS mobile teacher, Zalde has worked in communities of diverse tribal and religious backgrounds. He has mingled with the Matigsalogs of Sitio Malikongkong, and had been a teacher to the Obo-Manobo youth in Lumundaw. Reflecting that diversity, his students range from 15-year-old out-of-school youths to 35-year-old Manobo mothers.

Zalde beams with pride when he talks about work in the community, the five-kilometer walk and lack of access to electricity and potable water notwithstanding. He considers his work in Lumundaw as one of his major accomplishments as a teacher, where a community learning center, bare except for a blackboard, chairs and a mini-library, was constructed on private land which the owner had willingly lent, using government funds.

Providing an environment conducive for learning, the center has played a vital role in the education of out-of-school youth and has already produced three elementary graduates who now qualify for secondary school.

Recently, Zalde was one of the nearly twenty teachers from the Marilog Central Elementary School (CES) chosen to undergo the Intel Teach: Getting Started Course at the Ateneo de Davao University. He was once assigned in this public rural school, some 50 kilometers away from downtown Davao.

Located in a rural area that could not be connected to the grid, the Marilog Central Elementary School currently has no access to electricity. It was, however, chosen to be energized by the Alliance for Mindanao Off-grid Renewable Energy (Amore) Program, but not using traditional sources of energy, but using solar power instead through solar modules donated by SunPower Corporation, a solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturing company.

Amore is a rural electrification program that has been giving energy access to off-grid remote rural communities in Mindanao using technologies such as solar and micro-hydro. Since 2002, over 13,000 households in more than 400 villages have been given access to renewable energy technologies. Over 200 rural schools have been powered by renewable energy, as well, that allowed them to run multimedia-based distance education materials.

Alongside the coming of electricity to Marilog CES will be the installation of information, communication and technology (ICT) equipment courtesy of Intel Technology Philippines, Inc., a local subsidiary of Intel Corporation, a semiconductor company. At least five personal computer units will soon aid the education of 557 students at the public school.

Designed to train rural teachers on ICT, the four-day training included a series of lectures, presentations, and workshops on information technology including word processing, multimedia, spreadsheets, and their practical applications inside the classroom.

The school electrification and ICT project aims to improve the administrative and teaching capability of the teachers through the use of computer-aided technology. Through the use of renewable energy-powered multimedia technology, both teachers and students experience better teaching and learning conditions. Improved scores in government-administered tests, better student reception, and easier teaching experience are just some of the documented impacts of renewable energy-powered distance education.

On the third phase which will run from late-2009 to 2013, the AMORE Program is set to improve the learning experience of more school children in at least 150 rural schools.

SOURCE: http://www.sunstar.com.ph/davao/davao-rural-school-teachers-learn-ict