- DepEd and EDCOM 2 launch 'Bayang Bumabasa: Mayors for Literacy' to enlist LGUs in improving foundational reading skills across the Philippines.
- 52 percent of Grades 1-3 students not reading at grade level, based on the 2024-2025 Comprehensive Rapid Literacy Assessment covering 5.4 million learners.
- DepEd Secretary Sonny Angara emphasizes LGUs' critical role in replicating innovative, high-performing local education models to raise national learning outcomes.
Local government units or LGUs play a vital role in assisting to increase the quality of learning outcomes of learners in basic education in the Philippines, the Department of Education (DepEd) said.
This is because the Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM 2) will launch the 'Bayang Bumabasa: Mayors for Literacy' on July 1. Through the EDCOM 2 program, mayors all over the country will be called upon to join in advancing the upgrade of foundational literacy in their respective LGUs.
"Enhancing the quality of education is a marching order from President (Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr.), and we think LGUs play a very important role", DepEd Secretary Sonny Angara said in a statement.
Angara made the statement after 52 percent of Grade 1 to Grade 3 students were said not to be grade level ready in reading, based on the Comprehensive Rapid Literacy Assessment (CRLA) for school year 2024 to 2025.
They are 2,851,215 of the 5,455,581 students in 18 regions across the country. "If we can expand the same kind of commitment and innovation that we've witnessed in some of our best-performing LGUs, we can raise learning outcomes nationwide", he said.
Out of the total learners assessed, 47.74 percent were at grade level for reading, followed by transition readers at 31.14 percent, developing readers, 8.95 percent, low emerging readers, 8.57 percent; and high emerging readers, 3.6 percent.
