Tuesday, August 05, 2008 Oledan: Learning equity By Radzini Oledan
TECHNOLOGY has great potential to enhance student achievement and teacher learning, but only if sufficient attention is paid to its importance and benefits.
Some are oblivious to the advantages that IT can bring and many consider IT infrastructure spending as an expense rather than an investment.
The widening disparity in performance across regions and population groups indicate that equity in education remains a serious concern.
It is apparent that the rapid expansion of the school system proceeded without ensuring the minimum requirements for delivering quality education. Too often, efficiency and quality have been unduly sacrificed if only to fulfill the constitutional mandate of free and universal education at the primary and secondary levels.
The extensive school system in the country has not been able to accommodate everyone to enroll and complete basic education. Less than 50 percent of children are able to attend preschool, thus depriving many of early childhood education.
Of every 100 students who enroll in grade one, only 67 reach grade 6 and 48 eventually reach 4th year high school.
This indicates a high fall-out rate, with a significant percentage of students dropping out between grades 2 and 4 even before functional literacy is achieved.
Studies revealed that those who dropped out or never attended school came from poor families whose parents have had little or no schooling.
Mindanao receives a disproportionate share of the education budget. The resources for education allocated for Mindanao regions and provinces are grossly inadequate based on population size and need.
Since the distribution of the education budget is based primarily on enrollment size, areas that have low school attendance get lower allocation for education. The prevailing allocation system must be modified to provide larger resources especially for areas that are lagging behind in terms of enrollment size, survival rate and performance.
Investment in information technology may bridge the gap. The most difficult challenge is how to reach those who are in the margins of development. Even reaching the so-called 'ordinary' poor would entail challenges of electrical power, telecommunications connectivity and human resources infrastructure, and the like.
The benefits of IT seem well suited for coping with the problems of basic literacy and technological literacy, and enhancing the socio-economic consequences for the lives of the users.
For many in the target population who are unable to sit in classrooms and are too old for the formal school system, the interactive nature of IT can provide useful solutions.
The diversity of the population (young and adult learners) requires the kind of customer focus that, when properly employed, is potentially far more effective within the IT realm than by individual teachers.
This is not an overly narrow focus on IT. Indeed, commensurate attention should first and foremost be about learning and about culturally appropriate content.
No amount of hardware and access can be a substitute, and significant losses of costly infrastructure have been wasted when this principle has been ignored.
