MANILA, Philippines – The Department of Education (DepEd) has started the distribution of over 230,000 laptops to public school teachers and administrative officers.
For the first batch, the DepEd turned over 209 MacBook Neo laptops to public school teachers and administrative officers across 10 schools in Dagupan City, Pangasinan, on Monday, November 9.
Among the recipients was Dagupan City National High School, which got 72 MacBook Neo units — a huge jump from the four official laptops it had for teachers. The school has 312 personnel, serving around 5,000 high school students.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos attended the turnover ceremony.
“I know many of you bought your own, used your own salary, just to do the work that you have to do. That should not be your burden anymore,” Marcos told teachers in a speech.
TURNOVER. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. leads the turnover of laptops under the DepEd Computerization Program at Dagupan City National High School in Pangasinan on November 9, 2026. Photo from Presidential Communications Office
The latest batch of procured laptops under the DepEd Computerization Program includes 172,654 MacBook Neo units and 62,717 Windows-based units. The MacBooks will be distributed until March 2027.
According to the education department, it procured and delivered 140,430 laptops for teachers from 2022 to 2025.
With around 900,000 public school teachers in the country, here’s how the DepEd will decide who will receive new laptops:
Who’s the priority?The distribution focuses on schools that have not previously received teacher laptops through the DepEd Computerization Program, other government programs, local government units, or donors.
For the latest batch of laptops, qualified teachers must have the following:
- An active teaching assignment
- An active DepEd email with multi-factor authentication enabled
- No working laptop issued by the government or school and received between January 1, 2023 and November 6, 2026
The education department clarified that having shared equipment or a personally bought laptop will not disqualify a teacher.
“Selection within each school strictly prioritizes teachers with the greatest need for a functional device by evaluating their existing access to gadgets, teaching responsibilities, and digital readiness consistently and fairly,” the agency said.
If eligible teachers exceed available units, the first priority will be teachers without a government-issued laptop who “actively lead educational technology efforts, such as ICT (information and communications technology) coordinators, EdTech champions, or Khan Academy teachers.”
How about the others?The second priority would be all other eligible teachers without a government-issued laptop.
The third priority category consists of teachers who were previous laptop recipients, but their units have been declared unserviceable, destroyed by calamities, or lost to theft or robbery.
“Seniority and non-teaching duties do not grant priority. If a priority group exceeds remaining units, schools must conduct a witnessed drawing of lots manually or through the Teacher Assignment for Laptop Allocation (TALA) system,” the DepEd said.
The TALA system is the education department’s new registration app for device inventory and property management.
NEW LAPTOPS. Teachers of Dagupan City National High School in Pangasinan try out their MacBook Neo units on November 9, 2026. Photo from Presidential Communications Office
What’s the job of school heads?
School heads must review teacher assignments and individual laptop issuance history. This must be coordinated with the school property custodian.
The finalized list, which includes recipients and ranked alternates, must be encoded into the TALA system by Sunday, November 15.
The DepEd reminded recipient schools that laptops remain government property.
“Teachers promoted or reassigned outside the teaching track must surrender their devices for reallocation. Units will be enrolled in DepEd’s Mobile Device Management system, and unauthorized sales or transfers are strictly prohibited,” it said. – Rappler.com