Rep. Poe: DICT on track to link all DepEd schools to internet by December
MANILA, Philippines–Representative Brian Poe has affirmed the Department of Information and Communications Technology’s commitment to connect all Department of Education target schools by December.
“The commitment of DICT is that by the end of this year, they will be able to connect all the target sites of DepEd,” Poe said during the Sept. 29 budget hearing for the 2026 General Appropriations Bill, where he sponsored DICT’s budget.
He reiterated a pledge made by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in his State of the Nation Address to close the digital divide in education.
For the government, “connected” means meeting strict and measurable performance criteria. For schools served by low Earth orbit satellites, the minimum download speed is 5 megabytes per second and the upload speed is 1 to 2 megabytes per second.
DICT is monitoring compliance and engaging with service providers to ensure performance.
“If our colleague has any instances where there are any sites that are too slow or not keeping up with the standards of DICT, I believe the agency is open to flagging these service providers because it is our goal at the end of the day to provide the best services possible to the Filipino people,” Poe said.
Outdated networks are also being retired.
“DICT has communicated to me that they are doing away with old technologies such as 2G and 3G, so that by next year, only new technology like LTE and 5G will be allowed by our service providers,” he said.
The effort is backed by historic funding. The 2025 national budget includes the largest Wi-Fi appropriation in Philippine history — P5 billion in automatic annual funding, plus an additional P2.5 billion infused last year as a presidential priority.
Of that, P1.5 billion is specifically allocated to fulfill the December connectivity target. An additional P1.5 billion is also proposed in the 2026 budget to connect the remaining 12,139 DepEd schools.
Sustainability remains a concern, but Poe expressed optimism. “Ngayon, hopefully when this budget passes, mabibigyan po sila din ng maintenance and operating funds to be able to maintain the connections that they will build in our schools,” he said.
He emphasized the weight of the promise.
“The reason why I am so firm in this commitment is this was a SONA commitment of the president, and it is a priority of the DICT and a commitment we made to the Filipino people. So I believe that when they tell me three times in a row that they will connect all the schools by December, gagawin po talaga nila,” he said.
Moving forward, DICT plans to sustain momentum by institutionalizing performance-based connectivity, retiring legacy networks, and securing operational funding.
