AS the fight versus the pandemic rages, relief efforts continue the march to contain the spread of the virus and for those affected to deal with shortages of food, among others. From gift certificates to insurance packages, from working capital loans to more personal protective equipment, frontliners are getting support; but already included in the efforts are connectivity and online learning discussions that will help students even in post-COVID-19 life.
P5M GCs
The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) has donated P5 million worth of 10,000 supermarket gift certificates to Project Ugnayan, the collaborative initiative between the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation and top business groups, companies and institutions.
The company said this is on top of its P1-billion assistance to the national government’s COVID-19 response and relief efforts.
“NGCP made a pledge to continue finding opportunities beyond our previous aids to help combat the effects of COVID-19 in our country, and we are staying true to that promise. This contribution to Project Ugnayan will hopefully sustain more families severely affected during this period,” the company said.
Project Ugnayan aims to support families affected by the outbreak of COVID-19 and the imposition of the extended enhanced community quarantine by providing supermarket gift certificates to over 1,500,000 economically displaced families in Metro Manila.
PPEs, free insurance
Insular Foundation together with contributions from employees, agents, families and friends of Insular Life and its subsidiary, Insular Health Care Inc. raised funds to assist medical workers who are leading the fight against COVID-19.
The amount raised was used to donate personal protective equipment (PPE) sets to nine hospitals in Metro Manila, and included cash donations to the Philippine Nurses Association — Cebu Chapter, Clark Investors and Locators Association and Angeles Chamber of Commerce and Industry for the purchase of PPEs.
Insular Foundation will provide free care packages amounting to P27.5 million consisting of life insurance and hospitalization allowance for doctors, nurses, medical technologists, and other frontliners in selected hospitals.
During the first week of the enhanced community quarantine, Insular Foundation was the first responder to the call of Muntinlupa City Mayor Jaime Fresnedi. Program manager Teresita Melad turned over a check donation to the Muntinlupa City government to support the city’s relief distribution efforts.
Melad also turned over various kitchen equipment and food supplies to the medical frontliners of Ospital ng Muntinlupa who are temporarily staying in Tunasan, Muntinlupa.
$250,000 from TI
Texas Instruments (TI) announced a donation of US$250,000 to support COVID-19 relief efforts including personal protective equipment (PPE), and provide food aid to communities around Baguio City and Clark Freeport Zone where two of their factories are located.
“TI has always been committed to building stronger communities, ever since our founding,” said Sarjit Kaur, managing director of TI’s factory in Clark. In the early stages of the Luzon enhanced community quarantine, TI employees quickly sourced and donated 600 cleanroom bunny suits, 200 booties, and 11,000 vinyl gloves to local hospitals in Baguio, Angeles and Mabalacat to help protect medical frontliners.
Working capital support
To help ensure and encourage business continuity during the extended enhanced community quarantine (ECQ), FDFC, the fintech company behind the digital credit app BillEase, and eCommerce giant Lazada, announced the rollout of Lazada Seller Financing, a financial relief program to support micro and small businesses impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Through the program, Lazada sellers who have operated for at least 6 months can apply for financing and enjoy a digitalized application via BillEase for Business. Existing online merchants who need additional capital to operate can apply online for a loan based on their sales record prior to the lockdown.
With BillEase for Business, online sellers can use their pre-ECQ Lazada transactions as basis to get a working capital loan. Loans are processed within one banking day and successful applicants can enjoy an extra one-month grace period for loan repayment as part of the program.
The two companies also announced the extension of its zero percent installment program for consumers availing essential goods until April 30.
Fight vs scam
As the country continues to observe the enhanced community quarantine, scammers posing as bank personnel urge unsuspecting clients to verify their bank accounts by clicking on a link which to a legitimate-looking website where they are tricked to share personal information such as account number, credit card information, online banking login details like usernames and passwords, and One-Time PINs (OTP).
BDO Unibank said it will never ask their clients to verify their bank accounts. Legitimate bank officers, it says, will never reach out via SMS, call, email, or social media to ask for personal information for account validation.
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), alongside the various banks, have been encouraging clients to bank online over visiting their branches particularly at this time when the entire country is moving to flatten the COVID-19 curve.
BDO, for its part, continues to encourage its clients to bank from home and enroll to BDO Online Banking. To guide clients who may be banking online for the first time, the bank promotes how-to videos on its YouTube page and has helpful posts on its Facebook page and official website.
The Bankers Association of the Philippines (BAP) already called on account holders to be more vigilant.
Through its #BDOAntiScam campaign, BDO empowers its clients with information teaching them how to be smarter than scammers.
Clients who have been scammed, or even just suspect of being scammed, can get in touch with BDO by emailing customercare@bdo.com.ph. They can also log in Messenger, look for BDO Customer Care with the blue verified checkmark from Facebook, and chat with a bank representative.
E-Learning
About 200 educators recently joined the E-Skwela webinar hosted by Globe myBusiness on how to migrate classes online as schools have been closed under the COVID-19 enhanced community quarantine protocols.
A robust discussion on the Philippines’ e-learning roadmap took place among a panel of experts that included Mark Arthur Payumo Abalos, Education Industry Lead at Globe and Learning Technologies Scholar; Bro. Dennis Magbanua, FSC, Community Director at La Salle College, Hong Kong; Rogelio Dela Cruz, Head of the Center for Instruction, Research, and Curriculum- Education Technology Office at De La Salle College of Saint Benilde; Miguel Bermundo, Head of the Citizenship and Advocacy Marketing Division at Globe; and Gerson Abesamis, Executive Director of Habi Education Lab and Senior Lecturer at UP Diliman and Miriam College.
The discussion focused on the aspects of online learning for students as a way to address the current challenges in the educational system. It was also a forum for sharing best practices among the experts, along with ideas on how to build on e-learning as a complementary tool even during normal school operations.
Abesamis cited that while many teachers have already been reaching out to students and fellow faculty members with communities on Facebook Messenger, some have also started creating their own short learning videos. This has given opportunities for self-paced independent learning and critical thinking. Among the challenges Abalos mentioned connectivity as one of the problems facing teachers.
Online safety for students is another concern brought up in the discussion with Magbanua citing a wealth of learning resources that can be found on the internet, which have to be carefully curated for data protection and security purposes.
As for best practices, Magbanua cited the Hong Kong model, where students have already become accustomed to e-classes even before the onset of COVID-19 which made the transition easier for them with early adoption of digital learning.
In support of this, fellow panelist Abalos mentioned that the answer to the Philippine challenge is to get teachers onboard as quickly as possible with a roadmap part of which is the identification and familiarization of digital tools that are teacher-ready and child-friendly.
