DepEd launches ten-year plan to improve learning quality

By Almira Louise S. Martinez, Reporter

The Department of Education (DepEd) launched the Quality Basic Education Development Plan (QBEDP) 2025-2035 on Tuesday, aiming to improve the quality of learning among Filipino students.

“Ito na yung operationalization nung ating [This is the operationalization of our] five-point reform agenda ,” DepEd Assistant Secretary for Strategic Management Roger B. Masapol told reporters.

Mr. Masapol added that the ten-year roadmap aligns with the Basic Education Development Plan (BEDP) released in 2022 and the five-point reform agenda in 2024.

“BEDP is also a long-term plan that articulates what to reform,” he said in Filipino. “Meanwhile, the Quality Basic Education Development Plan articulates how to reform.”

The QBEDP aims to have “basecamps” in 2028, 2031, and 2034 to guide and align the education sector in meeting global benchmarks.

“We all know that we have an ongoing crisis, and our main problem is quality,” Mr. Masapol said. “We want all of our programs and activities aligned towards addressing the quality of basic education.”

The ten-year program aims to improve the learning outcomes and performance of students, especially in international assessments, such as the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), through three key strategies: decentralization, digitalization, and public-private partnerships.

“We are hoping that we see a substantial improvement in our performance in PISA,” Mr. Masapol said. “At least be at par with Indonesia and Vietnam by 2030.”

President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr., in his fourth State of the Nation Address (SONA), underscored the learning crisis evident in the results of the 2022 PISA, with the Philippines ranking 76th out of 81 countries.

“The realities of our youth is very clear to us,” Mr. Marcos said in Filipino. “They lack literacy in mathematics, science, reading, and comprehension.”

According to Education Secretary Juan Edgardo “Sonny” M. Angara, the lack of digital literacy contributed to the low performance of students in the 2022 PISA.

“Students who used a computer for the first time during the PISA exam won’t face that situation again,” Mr. Angara told reporters in an interview. “Because we’ve now trained all students to take exams using a computer.”

The results of the 2025 PISA held from March to April in 208 schools nationwide will be released in September 2026.