BAGUIO CITY: Formal education is just a click away. Online courses are now accepted as formal education with the signing of the distance learning law.
Authored by Baguio Rep Nicasio Aliping Jr and signed by President Benigno Aquino on December 9, Republic Act 10650 has institutionalised distance education as a mode of delivery of open learning. Distance education is a mode of delivering instruction, often on an individual basis, to students who are not physically present in a traditional setting such as a classroom.
Aliping noted that students who have no means to attend formal schools are hesitant to enrol in distance learning programs, fearing that courses offered through these programmes will not be acceptable to companies.
But he said students need not worry anymore because RA 10650 has institutionalised distance learning. “This law applies to public and private Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) that have existing open learning and distance education programs, and prospectively, other higher education institutions that will be authorised as qualified implementers of open learning and distance education programmes,” said Aliping, vice chair of the House committee on higher and technical education.
RA 10650 mandates the Commission on Higher Education to assist HEIs in developing their capability to offer open learning distance education programs.
“It (also) mandates the University of the Philippines to lead in the development of the open distance learning and design model curricular programs that will serve as prototype programs to be implemented by other higher educational institutions,” Aliping added. Several private schools are already providing distance learning through correspondence and online courses.
The Philippine Star
