TWENTY-seven public schools in Cebu’s third district yesterday received P4.99 million worth of educational software that will serve as learning aids in Math and Science for elementary and high school students in the district’s six towns and one component city. Rep. Pablo John Garcia (Cebu, 3rd district) turned over 27 sets of learning software and personal computers (PCs) to public schools from Barili to Tuburan.

The software for elementary education focuses on Math, Science and English. The software for high school also includes Math and English modules while the science component is broken down into Biology, Chemistry and Physics.

The software and PCs were purchased using Congressman Garcia’s Priority Development Assistance Fund and turned over the schools through the Department of Education (DepEd) in a brief ceremony at the Capitol Social Hall this afternoon.

“My goal is to bridge the digital divide and put elementary and high school students in the countryside at par with their counterparts in the metropolitan areas. If technology is making learning easier, only those with access to technology will learn more and faster. The disadvantage to technology is that those who don’t have access to it will lag farther behind and faster,” Congressman Garcia said.

He continued, “So this is my small contribution to bridging the gap. This is just the start. I will devote most of the resources of my office to the education of children of the third district.”

DepEd has been tasked to arrange the teachers’ training in the use of the software. Under the purchase agreement, Softmax Software Solutions of New Delhi, India, the software developer, will provide free training to teachers on the use of their products.

Softmax is a leading developer of educational CD-ROMs in India.