MANILA, Philippines—Fronting the gates of the Green Meadow Academy at the far-end block of predominantly poor Barangay Ma-a in Davao City is an old mango tree, its fruits yellow and supple, many within arm’s reach. Unknown to his flock, Baptist Rev. Allan Omar Bonzo uses the tree to measure his success in instilling honesty and discipline to his students in the academy.

“I was very happy to learn from the owner that not a single fruit from the mango tree was missed. You look at those mouth-watering fruits, you can imagine the discipline and self-control my students had to muster,” says Bonzo, who is also fondly called Pastor Allan, with pride.

Decades ago, when he was 27, Pastor Allan, then an employee in a sales company, worried about the kind of values his children would pick up from their slum neighborhood.

“When my children go out, I worry that when they get back home they will be using bad words already,” he narrates.

It was also at this time that the young father was, as he calls it, “called to the ministry.” His new-found faith and the inspiration from the community pastor gave him a clear perspective on how to overcome his anxiety.

“I enrolled at the Bible School. It was here that I finally decided to put up a home school. I adopted the School of Tomorrow system,” Pastor Allan recalls.

ACE system

The system of education originated in the US state of Tennessee. It induces learning in a free environment of a home school while adopting innovative, individualized techniques in education, with emphasis on Christian education and values formation.

Also known as the Accelerated Christian Education or ACE, the curriculum is used in almost 600 schools all over the Philippines. According to the website sotphil.org, the School of Tomorrow “is more than quality academics.”

“The curriculum is built on a theistic philosophic foundation. Students learn to see life from God’s point of view. Their personal relationship with God and their personal responsibilities to family, church and community are of primary concern,” it says.

The education standards set by the ACE are recognized in the academe as top quality and advanced.

Delbert Hooge, executive director of the School of Tomorrow Philippines, says of its curriculum: “The school of tomorrow will do (wonders) for those who use the curriculum (which is individualized, scoped and sequenced) and procedures (developing character with each component). The different programs...all combine to make us a system of value.”

For Pastor Allan, the purpose of establishing the home school was mainly personal. “My original objective in putting up the school is as simple as ensuring that my children and maybe the children of my neighbors will get good education and proper values,” he says.

Finally in 1996, the Green Meadow Academy opened with 30 students. Through the support of his church mates and community, Pastor Allan strived to build a modern school in a lot he purchased from his own savings.

He supervised the construction of a three-story building that houses two big classrooms, one each for elementary and high school, and two airconditioned rooms for the pre-school. Within the compound, he built the chapel and his own house where his family had been staying all this time.

Over the years, the school grew to a full preschool, elementary and secondary learning center with 160 students and eight teachers or learning center supervisors.

Cornerstone principles

The school uses as a guideline the five cornerstone principles adhered to by the School of Tomorrow system:

• Students must be at individual levels where they can perform.

• Reasonable goals must be set.

• Students must be controlled and motivated.

• Learning must be measurable.

• Learning must be rewarded.

Nonconventional

Pastor Allan’s school is totally different from conventional schools with a typical formal classroom setting. Instead of a classroom, the student goes to a “multigraded learning center” with individual cubicles for each student.

Grades 1 to 6 students share the room which is overseen by three supervisors and three monitors.

Ensconced in his own cubicle, the student gets busy with his PACE (Packets of Accelerated Christian Education) module which he receives at the start of the semester. He learns Math, Science, Araling Panlipunan, Filipino and English, as well as minor subjects using separate modules.

For every module he finishes, the monitor or teacher puts a star on his chart posted at his cubicle.

“If the student works fast, he can be accelerated to the next grade level. Grades are based on the final exams,” Pastor Allan explains.

“When we were starting, there were criticisms that the curriculum we use is ‘Americanized.’ This may be true at the start because we get the modules then directly from Tennessee. But now we are allowed to revise the modules and print them here,” he says.