Education Secretary Sonny Angara on Tuesday highlighted how the highest education budget in the country’s history signals support for the ongoing reforms in the Department of Education (DepEd).

This comes after the Senate reinforced a PHP1.044 trillion budget for the DepEd in 2026, which represents more than PHP77 billion increase from the approved budget by the House of Representatives (HOR).

In a statement, Angara said this proposed budget, once enacted, will help “accelerate” reforms to enhance the quality of learning and promote accountability and future-readiness.

“Every peso added to the budget is a vote of confidence in our direction,” Angara said.

“It signals that Congress and the people expect us to deliver — and we intend to meet that expectation with transparency, urgency, and integrity.”

Among the programs that received an increase in budget support are textbook and learning materials, school-based feeding, disaster response and school safety systems, school infrastructure funds, an expanded workforce, and increased benefits for teachers, as well as the ARAL learning recovery program.

Under the Senate’s approved increased budget, funds were doubled to PHP29.29 billion from PHP11.16 billion to produce over 79 million learning materials and expand supporting reading materials for early grade levels, according to the DepEd.

The school-based feeding program’s budget is also pegged at PHP28.66 billion to serve 4.49 million Kinder to Grade 1 learners, as well as severely wasted and wasted students from Grades 2 to 6.

To intensify disaster response, the Senate increased the budget to PHP3.77 billion from PHP665 million in the 2026 National Expenditure Program (NEP) to cover the emergency operations center, add more micro weather stations, temporary learning spaces, and for the clearing operations of about 4,227 affected schools.

Besides these, the funds for infrastructure also grew to PHP85.41 billion from PHP28.06 billion to help address the perennial problem of classroom backlogs through the construction of 25,527 new classrooms and the repair of 11,886 rooms.

The increased budget also covers 323,916 new teaching items, 6,000 school principal items, 10,000 Administrative Officer II positions, 5,000 Project Development Officer I posts, alongside other increased benefits.

“The expanded budget gives us the room to fix what needs fixing. It also reflects the confidence placed in the reforms we are pushing forward—and we intend to justify that confidence with clear results,” Angara said.

Other programs with boosted fund allocations are the Last Mile Schools Program, Human Resource Development, Alternative Learning System, Electrification of Schools, Indigenous Peoples Education, Special Needs Education, and the Madrasah Education Program. (PNA)