PRESIDENT Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. announced on Monday that all public schools currently without internet access will be connected by the end of the year.

In his fourth State of the Nation Address (SONA) at the Batasang Pambansa in Quezon City, Marcos said almost 12,000 public schools throughout the country currently lack internet connections.

“Sinisiguro ng DICT (Department of Information and Communications Technology) at DepEd (Department of Education) na bago matapos ang taong ito, magkakaroon na ng koneksyon sa internet ang lahat ng pampublikong paaralan (The DICT and the DepEd assured that before the year ends, there will be internet connection to all public schools),” he said

He cited the completion of phases 1, 2, and 3 of the National Fiber Backbone project, which sought to boost internet speed throughout the country, as well as the expansion of the free Wi-Fi project of the DICT.

“Noong Hunyo 2022, mga apat na libong Free Wi-Fi sites lang ang mayroon tayo. Ngayon, halos labingsiyam na libo na ang Free Wi-Fi sites sa buong bansa! (In June 2022, we only had 4,000 free Wi-Fi sites. Today, we have almost 19,000 free Wi-Fi sites throughout the country),” he said.

He added that the distribution of more than one million free SIM cards with free data to schools has started in geographically isolated and disadvantaged areas (GIDAs).

“At dahil pinaganda at pinabilis natin, dadami pa ang mga bagong tower at cellsites sa mga GIDAs (And because we improved and accelerated internet speeds, there will be more new towers and cellsites in GIDAs),” he said.     (PNA)