Gokongwei Brothers Foundation, Khan Academy team up to support PHL education
THE PHILANTHROPIC ARM of the Gokongwei Group has partnered with the Philippine counterpart of nonprofit educational organization Khan Academy on Wednesday to help improve the country’s education sector.
Gokongwei Brothers Foundation (GBF) will provide investment support and thought partnership to Khan Academy Philippines, which seeks to reach one million learners by the end of 2026.
“Our partnership with GBF is both a thought partnership because they have been in the education space for 30 years, as well as investment support,” Khan Academy Philippines Chief Executive Officer Geraldine Acuña-Sunshine said during the partnership’s launch event in Pasig City.
“They provided a very important investment for us to get started. Going forward, we will need a lot of partners because the education crisis is huge. We’re really calling on other non-governmental organizations to support us, like in the telecommunications and gadget space,” she added.
Founded by financial analyst Sal Khan in 2008, Khan Academy offers a global education technology platform.
Khan Academy Philippines is the first international franchisee of Khan Academy. It aims to localize the platform’s content and align it with the Department of Education’s (DepEd) curriculum.
For school year 2024-2025, Khan Academy Philippines aims to expand to more schools across the country and to include more DepEd-aligned elementary Math courses.
It also eyes to introduce its artificial intelligence-powered teaching assistant, Khanmigo, and propose teacher certification courses for approval by the National Educators Academy of the Philippines.
“GBF in its 30 years of service, has had significant strides in improving access to quality education for both learners and educations. We see Khan Academy as an integral part of our plan to reach more learners to provide free quality education for all,” GBF Managing Director Lisa Gokongwei-Cheng said.
In August last year, Khan Academy Philippines was launched in 34 schools (30 public and four private) across Quezon City, Mandaluyong, Manila, Marikina, Makati, Pasig, Pasay, Las Piñas, and Dumaguete City.
The pilot launch for school year 2023-2024 included 71 Math teachers, 3,250 students, and 600 parents. It started with training Math teachers on how to use Khan Academy’s platform as teaching aid, strategies on growth mindset, mastery learning, and student progress monitoring.
Participating schools used various techniques such as dedicated “Khan Academy time” in their schedules, dedicated Wi-Fi use for the platform, and providing one device per student at a time for better learning experience. Parents were also oriented and included in the process to ensure that they could support their children’s use of the platform.
“Our expansion plans are hinged on partnerships with schools and companies like the Gokongwei Group and the GBF who share our vision of a better future through education,” Ms. Acuña-Sunshine said.
GBF is the largest private sector provider of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) scholarships in the country. — Revin Mikhael D. Ochave