SEOUL, 26 September 2014 – Twenty public school teachers from the province of Cavite completed a 12-day exchange and cooperation program on Friday, 26 September 2014 sponsored by Korea’s Ministry of Education (MOE) on the use of electronic media, educational technology and information and communication technologies (ICT) in education.

The teacher delegation from Cavite, led by Camille Lauren del Rosario, head of the Provincial ICT Office, undertook the training in Jeonju, the capital of its program partner North Jeolla Province in the southern part of South Korea. North Jeolla has trained 172 teachers from Cavite since the e-learning program started in 2005. The MOE, working with the Korea Education Frontier Association (KEFA), held the 4th Meeting of the e-Learning Club at COEX Convention & Exhibition Center on 18 September 2014 to open the program with local education officials from Seoul, Busan, Incheon, Gwangju, Daejeon, Ulsan, as well as eight provinces. Philippine Ambassador to South Korea Raul S. Hernandez joined the ambassadors of Bangladesh, Cambodia, Colombia, Dominican Republic and Sri Lanka, together with diplomats from Guatemala, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Laos, Paraguay, Peru, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam. In his opening remarks, Mr Seung Eungbae, Director General of the MOE’s Educational Information and Statistics Bureau, said Korea aimed to “serve as a bridge in reducing the digital divide in education” by organizing training programs, international exhibitions and conferences, and eventually “play a play catalytic role in facilitating international cooperation”. With funding support from MOE, North Jeolla donated 1,295 computers, 2 projectors, 2 TVs and 4 combination machines between 2005 and 2013 to provide much-needed exposure to primary and secondary students in Cavite on ICT utilization and education.