By Jennifer C. Tilos

Dumaguete City (25 May) -- Educational Software and other Information Technology (IT) products will be presented by the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) here through a launching forum on May 28, 2007 at 9:00 in the morning at the Colegio de Santa Catalina de Alejandria (COSCA).

According to Gibert Arbon, Officer-in-Charge of the Provincial DOST, the forum is to introduce the software products which being offered as a cost-effective means to enhance Science and Math education.

Arbon said, the computer-aided instruction materials on Science and Math are based on the current curriculum of the Department of Education (DepEd) which developed by the DOST 's Science Education Institute and the ASTI for elementary and secondary schools.

Some 35 participants including school principals, DepEd officials in the province and the media are expected to attend the launching.

On the same day, a training on Bayanihan Linux and Thin Client will be held at COSCA Computer Laboratory for the teachers, IT personnel from the local government units, students, national government offices and private sectors.

The training will focus on two open source-based computing solutions, Bayanihan Linux software, the cheap alternative to Microsoft Window and MS Office.

At present, Arbon said, some institutions find it desirable to shift to open source software in order to cost save and also avoid piracy issues. Thus, this training is meant to ease migration to more cost-effective yet legitimate software such as Bayanihan Linux, Arbon added.

For now, the Department of Education (DepEd) is preparing for the opening of classes and addresses for the scarcity of books which the Cabinet Secretary said, the government has procured and will distribute 105.7 million textbooks to all public schools for priority subjects like English, Mathematics and Science.

This will benefit 17 million students and will help attain a 1:1 textbook to pupil ratio for said subjects.

To address the lack of teacher, a total of 617 education supervisor positions, 1,458 Principal I items (1,359 for elementary level and 99 for secondary level) and 5,103 teacher 1 items have been created.

The government also intends to create a total of 16,000 new teacher items this school year to attain 1:45 teacher to pupil ratio in all public schools nationwide and ill up the shortage of teachers within the year.