Bringing TV to the classroom

Bringing TV to the classroom


Posted 02:12am (Mla time) Jan 22, 2005
By Rina Jimenez-David
Inquirer News Service



Editor's Note: Published on page A13 of the January 22, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer


TELEVISION may be derided as the "boob tube," but there is no denying its power. The ease with which novelty songs and dance moves, like "Otso-otso" or "Spaghetti Song," are picked up, learned and popularized attest to the extraordinary "teaching" power of TV, as well as to the viewing public's capacity (even eagerness!) to learn, retain and replicate what they see and hear on this medium.

For five years now, "Knowledge Channel" has been tapping TV's power as an educational medium by airing curriculum-based material that supplement the traditional "chalk and blackboard" lectures of teachers. Though its shows are aired on cable channels, Knowledge Channel Foundation has also embarked on a drive to bring its shows within the reach (or the eyes and ears-and minds) of public school students nationwide. Backed by a memorandum of agreement with the Department of Education, the Knowledge Channel today reaches almost two million elementary students and 700,000 high school students in 1,400 schools throughout 57 provinces.

Rina Lopez Bautista, president and CEO of Knowledge Channel Foundation Inc. (KCFI), is particularly proud of the fact that Knowledge Channel is beamed as far north as Itbayat, Batanes, and as far south as Bongao, Tawi-tawi.

This is because the foundation has worked, alongside numerous partners and sponsors, to bring not just free TV sets to public schools, but also free cable and satellite access, as well training and orientation to teachers and principals on the optimal use of this teaching tool.

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OVER THE LAST few days, this columnist was with a delegation of officers and staff of KCFI and other entities with the Lopez Group of Companies, as well as other media representatives, for the launch of Team Mindanao. Team Mindanao stands for "Television Education for Muslim Mindanao," a three-year project funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by an alliance of partners led by KCFI.

Team Mindanao is aimed at beaming the Knowledge Channel to 150 public schools and their students in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), bringing "world-class education to those who are in need of it."

Would not the money have been better used to build classrooms or provide schools with such basics as desks and cement floors? Thomas Kral, chief of the Office of Education of USAID, said one of their major concerns about the educational system in the ARMM schools was the high drop-out rate, with a source claiming only three percent of grade one enrollees manage to graduate from elementary, and of these, only 12 percent go on to finish high school. "Why build more classrooms if children are leaving school in such numbers?" Kral asked in an interview. "Perhaps what we need to address is the relevance and quality of the education that these schoolchildren get."

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AT THE LAUNCH of Team Mindanao in Datu Paglas, Maguindanao, which is itself a model of development not just for ARMM but for the whole country (more on this later), a student of the Datu Paglas National High School, accepting "the gift of knowledge" in behalf of other young people in ARMM, declared that "we have entered the world of information technology."

But for some schools and students, Knowledge Channel might well be their portal to the world of modernity. Doris Nuval, KCFI officer in charge of resource mobilization who has been based since November in Cotabato City to oversee Team Mindanao, tells of visiting schools in impoverished areas where the students squatted on floor planks resting on dirt floors. It nearly broke her heart to disqualify such schools, said Doris, mainly because they had no electricity or else their electrical supply was spotty and unreliable.

Part of Team Mindanao project's goals, in fact, is to provide schools in such areas with alternative and renewable energy (such as solar panels), and in other areas without access to cable, access to the Knowledge Channel through satellite technology. Perhaps in areas sunk in the mire of underdevelopment, what young people need is the chance to leapfrog to the world of technological advancements. Thanks to Knowledge Channel, that world has just been opened up to them.

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IS there such a thing as "the politics of dress”? Yes, there is, asserts political theorist and historian Dr. Mina Roces.

In fact, on Tuesday, Jan. 25, from 2:30 p.m.-5 p.m., she will expound on this theory when she opens the "Feminist Centennial Lecture Series" with a talk entitled "Ang Tela, Ang Terno, at Ang Boto: the Role of Clothing and Dress in the Suffrage Movement." The lecture will be held at St. John Room, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, St. Scholastica's College, Leon Guinto St., Malate, Manila.

The Feminist Centennial Lecture Series is sponsored by the NGO-GO National Network of the Feminist Centennial in the Philippines and the Department of History, Sociology and Political Science of St. Scholastica's College.

Dr. Roces teaches in the School of History of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. She is the author of "Women, Power and Kinship Politics: Female Power in Post-War Philippines" and "Kinship Politics: The Lopez Family: 1956-2000."

In "Ang Tela, Ang Terno at ang Boto," she explores "the politics of dress in the 20th century, focusing on how dress was linked to political agendas and political self-presentations in Philippine politics. It argues that there was a tension between Filipino Dress and Western Dress, which represented opposing identities." Is there a lesson somewhere here for the fashionistas of today?