LSI Contract On Advancing Basic Education In The Philippines Activity Extended

RTI International has extended its contract with the Learning Systems Institute (LSI) at Florida State University to continue supporting the Advancing Basic Education in the Philippines activity. Specifically, the LSI team will use its extensive experience to build the research capacity of Bicol University (BU), West Visayas State University (WVSU), and Department of Education (DoE) stakeholders, focusing on early literacy.

“The faculty from Bicol University and West Visayas State University, in addition to the COE Deans, had shared with us their need to build their research abilities,” said Principal Investigator Dr. Ana Marty. “We are excited about this contract extension because it allows us to work with the faculty and the DepEd official to strengthen their research skills while generating evidence that responds to the unique needs of the Philippines education system.”

LSI will engage the university faculty and staff from the Department of Education offices in regions 5 and 6 in participatory action research experiences to develop their research skills and provide opportunities to engage in rigorous education research. In addition to learning about literacy-based research methods, the goal of this activity will be to produce evidence that is contextually relevant to Filipino stakeholders and beneficial for early literacy instruction at schools and in pre-service training.

In the last three years, LSI partnered with RTI International strengthening the ability of the Philippines' pre-service teacher training institutions. LSI's primary responsibility was to strengthen the capacity of BU and WVSU to deliver the curricula for pre-service education through technical support in the development of early literacy syllabi and corresponding modules, as well as the enhancement of the capacities of faculty in the use of these modules.

LSI built the capacity of these two universities in implementing the Bachelor of Early Childhood Education (BECEd) and the Bachelor of Elementary Education (BEEd) curricula, with particular emphasis on early literacy instruction in the context of DOE’s Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE) program.