Australia likely to extend aid for ARMM education project

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines - Australia is likely to extend its financial support for a critical education program in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), Filipino officials said on Tuesday. The region’s Basic Education Assistance for Mindanao (BEAM) program is expected to continue for the next ten years after the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAid) pledged additional financial support. The project, which ended in November last year, would focus only on depressed communities in what is considered as among the Philippines’ poorest areas, which covers Basilan, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi, Maguindanao, and Lanao del Sur provinces. Worth $33-million, the extension seeks to intensify AusAid’s intervention in addressing the high dropout levels, elementary undergraduates, classrooms shortage, and inappropriate teachers’ instructional skills in the Muslim autonomous region. The proposed education program extension only covers the elementary level, ARMM Executive Secretary Naguib Sinarimbo said. But the ARMM will conduct a study and present proposals to other aid donors regarding the improvements of the region’s high school educational system, he added. The BEAM project ended after an eight-year mission that sought to assist public schools in reaching and maintaining higher standards of basic education. “Much has been achieved" by the BEAM project, said Ian D’Arcy Walsh, BEAM project director, during a farewell dinner in November last year hosted by the Department of Education in Cotabato City. During the dinner, Walsh cited a 24 percent and 15 percent improvement in primary and secondary education in the ARMM, respectively. The BEAM project covers 18 provinces in central and southern Philippines, focusing on improving access to quality education, providing better teaching and learning in Mindanao and the Visayas, and supporting national basic education reforms, the Philippine News Agency said. As the lead donor in basic education, Canberra has helped the Philippines meet one of eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which is to achieve universal primary education by 2015. BEAM has also been instrumental in providing tested innovations to the Department of Education. The project has influenced the Basic Education Sector Reform Agenda in standards setting, educational planning, learning outcomes management, financial management, educational administration and management, and monitoring and evaluation. With BEAM's support, over 5,000 schools are now implementing school-based management, and about 53,000 teachers have received training to strengthen their teaching skills and improve learning outcomes for children, the government news agency said. To improve the quality of Islamic instruction, including mainstream public schools, AusAid also helped train about 2,000 Muslim teachers and supported 30 Islamic schools to enable them to become accredited operators of private schools implementing the Standard Madrasah curriculum. - RJAB Jr./GMANews.TV