EDUCATION Secretary Sonny Angara yesterday said the department will tap Licensure Examination for Teachers (LET) passers who have yet to be hired as full-time teachers to tutor struggling students in public schools.
The DepEd and the Department of Social Welfare and Development launched last year a literacy program to teach 207, 000 students under its “Tara Basa!” program by 2025.
The program deploys college students to assist first-and second-grade public school students who are struggling to read. In exchange for the tutoring sessions, the college students receive work experience and cash based on the minimum wage in the respective regions where they are located.
The department said the program benefited more than 120, 000 public school students last year.
This time, Angara said they would also hire LET passers to the tutoring program.
“Mayroon tayong mga teachers na nakapasa sa licensure exams o LET pero hindi pa sila teaching formally. So, ‘yun ang priority natin dahil there’s I think 40, 000 or 60, 000 of them na nakapasa na pero hindi pa naha-hire as teachers (We have teachers who passed the licensure examinations or LET but are not yet teaching formally. So, that’s our priority because I think there are 40,000 or 60,000 of them who passed the exam but are yet to be hired as teachers),” Angara said.
Angara said they would eventually be hired as full-time teachers but for now, they are a priority to be hired as mentors or tutors.
“Maybe, in the course of 2025, we will be hiring 20,000 teachers. But it means we will still have a few thousand na hindi pa naha-hire (who have not yet been hired). And they are our priority,” he explained.
Aside from the LET passers, the DepEd chief said the department will also hire in-service or pre-service teachers for the mentoring program.
“Part of their practicum will be teaching, mentoring children kasi ‘yung tinuturo naman nila hindi naman ‘yan highly specialized skills, basic skills lang na kaya kahit college education major ka (because what they will be teaching are basic skills, not highly specialized ones, that even a college education major will be able to do),” he added.
Aside from the “Tara Basa!” program, Angara also said the Academic Recovery and Accessible Learning (ARAL) Law signed by President Marcos Jr. late last year also provided for the establishment of a pool of tutors who will help struggling learners catch up with their studies.
He said to assist struggling learners, the law will tap teachers, para-teachers, and pre-service teachers or students enrolled in a teacher degree program.
The tutors will be deployed to mentor learners to enable them to catch up on competencies like reading comprehension, mathematics and science.
