Education has evolved tremendously over past centuries. From studying under tree, to segregated schools, to public and private schools, and from black slates, to boards, and now to smart class, forms of education and how we receive it have come a long way and keep changing. With the introduction and deployment of technology in the sector, the education world is again going through another tremendous phase of change, be it in the way it teach, learn and even manage.
Countries across the globe are stepping ahead to build a thriving educational system to help meet the needs of the learners in the 21st century. Recognizing the needs, numbers of edtech companies have come up across the world with unique solutions and innovations to address various paint points in education world in their respective country or the world at large. Well, in fact, we are beginning to witness significant transformation in the entire education world.
While leaving aside the rest for a while, in this piece, we bring you some vital information about the edtech market in the Philippines.
The Philippines, a sovereign state in archipelagic Southeast Asia, is home to 108.12 million people, according to the latest UN estimates. It is the 13th most populated country in the world, which means the country has a sizeable number of young people who will become future workforce. However, like any other developing country in the world, Philippines has several issues when it comes to education. While the country’s system of education has long served as a model for other Southeast Asian countries, that system has deteriorated in recent years. The government’s inability to fully fund the entire education system, with most of its money earmarked for education going only to primary schools, has created a huge problem in the education sector in the country. Philippines’ budget allocation in the education sector is said to be one of the lowest among the ASEAN countries.
Not to forget, there is also a wide disparity in educational opportunities across various social groups among Filipinos. According to reports, while Manila, the capital and largest city in the Philippines, boasts a primary school completion rate of nearly 100 percent, other areas, such as Mindanao and Eastern Visayas, have a primary school completion rate as low as 30 percent or less. That’s quite alarming!
Besides, though these are common in almost every country across the world, Philippines is also grappling with various other issues such as high educational cost in private institutions, which makes it unaffordable for many low-income students, low-quality education, inadequate training or vocational institutions, and significant gap between educational degree and industry requirements, opening up a huge market for educational stakeholders to step in to address them.
No wonder, the above problems and challenges have given rise to many edtech entrepreneurs to come up with various solutions and innovations to help meet the needs and requirements of students, institutions and industries across the Philippines.
A global report presented by a US-based market research firm, Ambient Insight, has cited Philippines as one of the top 10 countries in the world in terms of high growth in e-learning revenues in the next few years. This is mainly due to the fact that there is so much to explore, create and develop to help meet the growing needs of the people and the country. One of the driving forces behind this recognition is Philippine e-learning Society, a group that has been actively promoting and offering e-learning solutions across the country. The group has members mainly from colleges and universities in both public and private sectors.
To help you understand the edtech market in the Philippines, we take a look at some of the edtech startups and companies that have come up and working hard to enhance the education sector in the country.
Edukasyon
A social enterprise specially designed for Filipino youth, Edukasyon connects students to educational opportunities through an online platform and promotes career awareness among them. It provides comprehensive information to help students advance their education by searching and applying for private and public schools, courses, programs, scholarships, and track their performance. It also helps students choose the right career path.
PhilSmile
PhilSMile is one of the popular all-in-one school management systems for academic institutions. It covers multiple areas from enrolment to grading to financials. The application enables schools to maintain and build relationships with students and parents. It informs parents about the performance and grade of their child. PhilSmile has helped more than 40 schools to upgrade their system to make it more efficient and build relationships with students and parents.
PhilSmile also offers a unique payment facility through which the overseas Filipino can pay the child’s tuition directly to the school.
Zzish
This UK-based platform was established in the year 2014 with a mission to get the best education apps and resources into the hands of every learner in the world, especially Filipino. It helps teachers analyze the performance of their class and optimizes their approach to meet the needs of every student. Until now, it has improved the educational outcomes of more than 120,000 students in the Philippines.
Learntalk
Learntalk is an on-demand language school. It has been developed by Filipino entrepreneurs in cooperation with the British Council to deliver customized classes to individuals and businesses based on their learning needs. English being one of the most used foreign languages in the world, Learntalk aims at democratizing access to high-quality English teachers through video-call lessons. It helps Filipinos advance in their English language skills by offering high-quality, affordable lessons through video calls outsourced from the main office in Manila. The company also has a branch in Hong Kong.
KITE eLearning Solutions
As the name suggests, KITE eLearning Solutions is an educational solutions company which specializes in design and development of interactive lessons, assessment programs, multimedia products, digital publications, web-based applications, and other e-learning programs for academic institutions, and also digitization of print publications.
Besides, it develops engaging and relevant game-based application apps to help students develop their critical thinking and creativity by applying curriculum-based lessons. It also generates learning objects with various levels of complexity from a single-screen interaction to highly interactive, simulated environments that respond to a variety of user inputs. The company also designs computer-based assessment tools and stimulating alternatives to drill-and-practice exercises, complete with built-in automated feedback and scoring facility.
JakenPoy’s Study Buddy
JakenPoy’s Study Buddy is a fun-based learning platform designed to give access to free ready-made reviewers as well as make new ones. Later, parents can assign these to their kids, to play their part on Study Buddy for Kids.
This cost-free platform is advantageous for teachers too. Through this tool, they can store their work, thus eliminate repetitive work of making them again. It also allows teachers to assign home work to their students based on DepEd’s official curriculum.
Seeing as one of the top 10 countries for high growth in e-learning revenues, edtech sector in Philippines is taking off at a faster pace. However, it still has a long way to go in providing easy access to the e-learning environment for students, giving adequate training to teachers and educators, and providing helpful resources and right equipment to institutions.
