What are Filipinos afraid of?

United States, Singapore and Australia – Universities and top echelons of the world have embraced distance learning as part of their daily lives. Nancy Lewis, director of worldwide management at IBM New York, said, "We have been able to provide five times as much content, at one-third the cost, with e-learning." Studies from FedEx and Xerox have proven that ROI (return on investment), content retention and learning curve are 75 percent higher, but why is it only in the Philippines that this upward curve seemed to have lost its track?

Dozens of analysts cite three hindrances: lack of telecommunications companies (to provide lines for the Internet), deficiency in the number of computers, and finally, our economy. It does not take an analyst though to prove how bad our economy really is, but should we just sit here and do nothing?

A number of companies have implemented e-learning but unfortunately have experienced unsatisfactory results. Why? E-learning’s main advantage is to learn anywhere, anytime, but this does not necessarily mean that you will entrust everything to the person; it is a given that employees and students will take this for granted. Therefore, not achieving the maximum potential of the course and with the Filipino mentality, the provider gets blamed for their wrongdoings.

A large number of learners should be assisted by an instructor/teacher. One feature of the learning management system allows the teachers to track their students individually. It will show who is excelling and who is doing poorly. With this, the professor can focus on each student’s needs.

It frustrates me that our own system realizes the importance of technology for this Third World country but worries more about the pork barrel or the Manny Pacquiao match. Let us not take this opportunity for granted because your future is just a click away with Yapster e-Learning.

"I don’t need to know everything. I just need to know where to find it and when I need it." – Albert Einstein

* * *

Kathy Arceo is a senior sales consultant of Yapster e-Learning Inc., which has been providing e-learning and classroom training services for five years to more than 80,000 learners around the world. With more than 1,500 subject titles, Yapster e-Learning is accredited by local and international institutions. For more information, visit www.2studyit.com. For comments, e-mail at [email protected]