MORE than 138,000 people, including 72,000 students, stand to benefit from this year’s “Tara, Basa” tutoring program of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), which starts on May 19.
Under the program, college students — mostly from state universities and colleges — will tutor incoming grade 2 learners from public schools about comprehensive reading to prepare them for the next school year.
“The DSWD is now ready for the expanded Tara, Basa! Tutoring Program. We have been conducting several capacity-building and training sessions for college students who will be deployed as tutors and youth development workers (YDWs) to ensure that they are ready to teach struggling or non-reader elementary students and their parents or guardians,” DSWD assistant secretary and spokeswoman Irene Dumlao said yesterday.
She said 138,407 individuals, composed of around 12,000 college students who would serve as tutors, some 60,000 incoming Grade 2 learners, along with some 60,000 parents or guardians, and 6,019 YDWs would benefit from the program.
The college students will be paid based on the prevailing regional daily minimum wage rate in exchange for rendering 20 tutoring and learning sessions to the grade 2 learners.
The YDWs – who would also receive a daily stipend — would facilitate the Nanay-Tatay teacher sessions which aims to orient and train the parents or guardians of the learners on how to motivate their children and ensure that they continue to study even after they complete the program. The parents or guardians of the grade 2 students would also receive food packs and stipend for attending the Nanay-Tatay sessions.
Dumlao said this year’s program will be implemented in regions I (Ilocos Region), Region III (Central Luzon), IV-A (Calabarzon), IV-B (Mimaropa), Region V (Bicol Region), Region VII (Central Visayas), Region VIII (Eastern Visayas), Region IX (Zamboanga Peninsula), Region IX (Northern Mindanao), Region XII (Soccsksargen), XIII (Caraga), the National Capital Region (NCR), and the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).
The “Tara, Basa!” tutoring program, which the DSWD launched in 2023, is undertaken in partnership with the Department of Education (DepEd) and has already benefited 197,000 college students, elementary learners, and their parents or guardians since.
It has been declared a flagship program in 2024 by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. through Executive Order 76.
