Fifteen million illiterates in the last six years.  I am gravely concerned how illiteracy has grown over the years.

Government must strengthen the country’s alternative educational programs to address the growing number of illiterate Filipinos which has reached 15 million in the last six years.

According to the Functional Literacy, Education, and Mass Media Survey (FLEMMS), which is done every five years to determine literacy rate in the country, of this total number, 11 million Filipinos do not have functional literacy and four million do not have basic literacy.

Whatever the reasons why our fellow Filipinos are not able get education must be addressed in the soonest possible time.

While the state provides free elementary and secondary education, we also know that schooling costs go beyond tuition. There are other expenses that families bear in sending their children to school. I myself was a product of the public school system, and I saw how my parents put us through school.

In view of this, the education department’s alternative learning system (ALS) must be strengthened. This is the only way we can reach most of the 15 million, if not all. Our formal education system cannot do the job alone.

One primary reason for this ballooning illiteracy rate is poverty. I surmise that most, if not all, of the 15 million are in the far-flung communities, who do not have the money to travel to school, or buy school supplies, or have money for baon.

The ALS, delivered by the Bureau of Alternative Learning System (BALS), is an educational route parallel to formal basic education, which on the other hand is delivered by the bureaus of elementary and secondary education. The BALS, formerly known as the Bureau of Non-formal Education, is an integral bureau of the Department of Education.

The programs under the alternative learning system would allow an adult illiterate to get basic literacy, and an out-of-school adult or out-of-school youth acquire functional literacy almost at no cost.  And their education can reach them wherever they are, because the alternative learning system delivers education outside the classroom.

We should work double-time to prevent this 15 million to balloon some more. The country’s alternative learning programs should be given the budget sufficient enough to bring education to the people.

I have always said that education levels the playing field, that it is the route to fight poverty, and that because it is a right, our 15 million fellow Filipinos should get their education, wherever they are, at whatever time.