About 5K Cebu City schoolkids undergo ‘Tara Basa!’ tutoring program

CEBU CITY: About 5,000 grade-schoolers in this capital city are now enjoying a specialized tutoring session with college students tapped to teach struggling and non-reading learners, a regional social welfare official said Thursday. Shalaine Marie Lucero, regional director of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD)-Central Visayas, said 584 college students from the Cebu Normal University (CNU), a premier teaching institution in the Visayas, will assist 4,865 learners from 67 public elementary schools here. Under the Tara, BASA! Tutoring Program of the national government, Lucero said 487 college students of CNU have been tapped to serve as tutors and youth development workers (YDWs) while 97 of them are now doing the 'Nanay-Tatay' sessions for the learners' parents. The tutors and YDWs are provided educational support through the cash-for-work mechanism, in exchange for their service in conducting learning and reading sessions. These tutors will assist the struggling and non-reader elemen tary learners with the 20-day after-school reading sessions, and the YDWs will conduct the parenting sessions with parents or guardians on the care and protection of children and guide them to be the first teachers at home or as Nanay-Tatay teachers. Meanwhile, the 4,865 learners from 67 public elementary schools were pre-identified during the comprehensive rapid literacy assessment (CRLA) of the Department of Education (DepEd) in June last year. The program is a holistic social welfare and development model that creates a learning ecosystem where college students from low-income families will be capacitated and deployed as tutors and YDWs in their community. DSWD, DepEd, state colleges and universities, and local government units partnered in identifying struggling and non-reading learners as an effect of the challenges in adopting non-physical learning modalities during the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic. The 20-day tutoring session program here started on Friday last week in Cebu City aft er it was launched and pilot-tested in the National Capital Region in August 2023 which, after a good outcome, was extended to seven other areas across the country. Source: Philippines News Agency