A second chance, an uncertain future
For 24 years, the Arnold Janssen Catholic Mission Foundation, Inc. (AJCMFI), has raised money to keep its Alternative Learning System (ALS) program going. We have lost experienced teachers whose commitment to the mission I never doubted. Some moved to public schools because they needed better salaries to provide for their families. Others remain.
I understood their decision to leave. Our salaries were around the minimum-wage level, far below public school teaching salaries. Each departure meant losing someone who knew how to accompany learners returning after years away from school. Their years of working with ALS learners have developed skills that academic qualifications alone cannot provide.
While the Philippines battles to improve educational quality, community ALS providers like ours are also fighting to survive. The two concerns meet whenever we cannot retain a good teacher. If ALS is to offer a dependable second chance, the institutions delivering it need dependable support.
The AJCMFI partners with the Department of Education (DepEd) in delivering ALS. Our Catholic identity inspires this work. We equally serve Muslim learners in Marawi and Lanao del Sur, indigenous Molbog learners in Palawan, and learners, mostly from poor families, in several urban centers.
In Palawan, indigenous learners who acquired literacy can now cast their votes without someone else assisting them. In Metro Manila and Cavite, some learners have gained skills, found work, and began earning for themselves. Education gives them greater control over their own lives.
The Second Congressional Commission on Education’s (Edcom 2) 2026 final report, “Turning Point: A Decade of Necessary Reform,” reports that only 46.2 percent of ALS enrollees completed the program in school year 2023–2024. Sustaining the people and institutions delivering ALS must be part of improving that result.
Support through DepEd’s Abot-Alam program and its partnership with Development Academy of the Philippines showed how public financing could strengthen community ALS, including our work after the Marawi siege and in Lanao del Sur. It offers an experience worth building on.
In Rio Tuba, a mining company has continued supporting indigenous education. In Dasmariñas, the local government supports ALS. But in Balabac, there is no dependable sponsor to support our work. Educational opportunity should not depend on whether a community happens to have a corporate sponsor or benefactor.
Revised Special Education Fund guidelines allow local governments to support ALS, including hiring Community ALS implementors. Smaller providers should know how to apply, how proposals are assessed, and why support is granted or declined. National financing is also needed where local resources are limited.
Some of our more dependable support has come from parishes, private schools such as Saint Jude Catholic School, and religious congregations. Some diocesan and religious-owned schools also run their own ALS centers. Making ALS part of an institution’s continuing mission gives it greater stability. Religious and civic communities can build on this experience.
Private companies and individual benefactors have carried much of our mission’s cost. Overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) connected through Filipino chaplaincy work in Madrid, Berlin, Hong Kong, and Ansan have also helped. Non-Catholic supporters also believe that education can help people overcome poverty and make decisions for themselves.
An SVD mission procurator in Austria helped for about three years. Donors’ circumstances and preferences change, and repeated appeals can exhaust goodwill.
The ALS Support Group from Sacred Heart Parish Shrine in the Diocese of Cubao initiated “Swing to Educate 3,” a charity golf fundraiser for ALS. Their effort brings companies and individual benefactors into a shared educational cause.
I am considering a network of individuals who commit a modest amount regularly. Some SVD missions were sustained by members of their faith communities through small, consistent contributions. Our OFW supporters have shown similar generosity. Such a network needs honest reports and continuing trust.
Predictable contributions would help us plan teachers’ pay and classes beyond the next fundraising event. They would complement public partnerships and institutional donors. Public support must be accountable, and private generosity deserves the same care.
I hope companies, communities, and Filipinos worldwide will become regular ALS partners. Our teachers should be able to serve learners and provide decently for their own families.
After 24 years, we know that ALS can change lives. What remains uncertain is whether we can sustain the people who make those changes possible. Giving learners a dependable chance to learn is a responsibility we can share, whatever our faith.
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Fr. Jerome Marquez, SVD, is external linkages coordinator of AJCMFI and served on the Edcom 2 standing committee on basic education. The foundation can be reached at [email protected].
