The Naga Special Education Center continues its extensive learning journey with the children of the City of Naga.

In a special turnover ceremony, the RAFI Dolores Aboitiz Children’s Fund provided educational equipment and other materials to support the preparation of specialized learning modules and instructional materials for this academic year 2021-2022.

Naga Special Education Center (Naga SPED) caters to Elementary, Junior High, and Senior High learners with special needs. With a population of 386 students, Naga SPED is currently the only public school in the entire City of Naga Division that offers education for learners with different exceptionalities such as Autism, Blindness and/or Visual Impairment, Deafness and/or Hearing Impairment, Intellectual Disability, Multiple Disability, Orthopedic Impairment, Specific Learning Disability, Speech/Language Impairment, and children who are considered Gifted and Talented.

Thus, Naga SPED Center aims to prepare students with disabilities to successfully transition as independent adults within the community.

In the last year, access to special education during the pandemic has been a challenge. Several gaps in online and blended education were identified and needed to be addressed, especially in the aspect of providing special education to learners with different exceptionalities and disabilities. With the challenges faced by both teachers and young learners throughout this pandemic, Naga SPED Center aims to continue providing quality education even in the context of distance learning.

Some of the identified gaps in delivering quality inclusive education include conducting online classes, mass production of quality learning resources, distribution, and retrieval of self-learning modules.

The “Agak Tinun-an” program is anchored on their transition program. It aims to provide comprehensive and strategic learning experiences and transition services for learners with special educational needs (LSEN’s). It is designed to help LSEN’s become functional and independent members of the community in spite of their disabilities.

“The Agak Tinun-an program focuses not only on the transition curriculum implementation but the whole transitioniong process for learners to provide adaptive and practice life skills to be independent, functional, and holistically developed Filipinos,” shared Heziel S. Omambac, Teacher I of the Naga SPED Center.

This transition program makes use of a specially designed care package that will empower learners in their transition from school to home education, as well as school to community engagement. This care package includes targeted self-learning modules and supplemental worksheets distributed every week to provide interactive and engaging learning materials.

In support of Naga SPED Center’s commitment to providing access to quality special education even amidst the pandemic, RAFI-DACF provided a grant for educational equipment (printers, scanners, laminators, and laminating films) with a total estimation cost of Php 30,000.

RAFI-DACF believes that it is the right of all children, including children with special educational needs, to receive equal access to inclusive education which is appropriate to their needs. Children that are gifted, have any kind of mental, physical, or emotional disabilities deserve to have quality special education. They require special type of teaching approaches or care, or special equipment that can be used to maximize learning capacities both within and outside the regular classroom.

The Dolores Aboitiz Children’s Fund of the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation, Inc. (RAFI-DACF) aims to enable communities to champion for children to reach their own potentials. Its Grants Program supports initiatives promoting the welfare and development of children through Early Education and Health and Nutrition.