2 Visayas public schools to pilot Globe's Global Filipino Schools (GFS) program

MANILA, Philippines - Leading telecommunications provider Globe Telecom has chosen Palo National High School in Eastern Visayas and Bilar National High School in Central Visayas to pilot its Global Filipino Schools (GFS) program as both institutions showed exemplary maturity in the use of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in learning and teaching.

The Department of Education (DepEd) and Coalition for Better Education (CBE) with support from Microsoft Philippines are collaborating with Globe on the program which will be implemented nationwide beginning this year. GFS program is a competency-building initiative that utilizes communications technology to help students, teachers, and school heads in select public high schools nationwide.

Globe expects to put up one GFS per region in the next three years even as the company plans to invite local government units to participate in the undertaking by helping fund one GFS in their own municipality in the next 10 years.

GFS aims to establish centers of expertise in ICT for education in the Philippine public school system to build a community of learners who can maximize technology to lead their respective communities. At the same time, it hopes to promote public-private partnership to improve the quality of education in the country.

GFS is one of the programs launched by Globe in response to the 2030 Education for All (EFA) Global Monitoring Report released by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) which ranked the Philippines as an underperformer in implementing reforms when it comes to universal access for primary education.