A social listening report from Capstone-Intel revealed that the social media presence of the Department of Education has received 60.6 percent negative mentions on both social and non-social media platforms across the country, highlighting the recent issues embattling the department and its secretary, Vice President Sara Duterte, as the reasons for the department’s negative social media presence.
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Background
On Tuesday, February 20, the Department of Education (DepEd) announced that schools will gradually return to the traditional academic timetable, with courses beginning in June and taking a break from April to May.
The gradual shift will formally commence in the academic year 2024-2025, with school starting on July 29 and ending on May 16, 2025.
The DepEd previously made a “minor” change in the current school year by moving the finish date to May 31 rather than June 14. This was included in DepEd Order No. 3, series of 2024.
However, despite this, DepEd has been at the center of discussions following the alleged rift between its secretary, VP Duterte, and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and her previous linkage with requests for confidential funds.
Methodology
Capstone-Intel Corp. examined the online presence of the “Department of Education” in the country as a topic of discussion for one week, from February 20 to 28, 2024, by utilizing all publicly accessible posts from social and non-social media platforms in order to gather the sentiments of the public about the education department.
Facebook Performance
Capstone-Intel found that the “Department of Education” garnered a 182,840.8 engagement score for its 3,411 total post count, which yielded over 424,934 total reaction count. The bulk of the engagement score and total post count were all due to the discussions about the return of the old academic calendar being talked about by supporters and other influencers, which heightened the social media presence of the “Department of Education” across the country.
When broken down, “Facebook like” accounts for 51.4 percent of the total reactions, with 218,288. Followed by “Facebook love” with 183,478 reactions (43.2 percent), “Facebook haha” with 13,418 (3.2 percent), “Facebook wow” with 7,482 (1.8 percent), “Facebook sad” with 1,684 (0.4 percent), and “Facebook angry” with 584 reactions.
Looking at the data, the majority of “Facebook like” and “Facebook love” reactions, or 94.6 percent of social media users when combined, can be attributed to several Filipino social media users showing excessive support for the proposal to revert the academic calendar to the traditional setup, as most of the top posts for DepEd were discussing the reversion of the old school calendar in the Philippines.
Online mentions
Capstone-Intel likewise revealed that the “Department of Education” received 60.6 percent negative mentions, and the remaining 39.4 percent were positive mentions. This means that the article mentions about the “Department of Education” was mostly angled negatively.
These issues gathered by Capstone-Intel that resulted in the negative social media presence of DepEd were linked to the alleged issues between Duterte and Marcos and her previous appeals for confidential funds, which positioned the education department at the forefront of controversy in the country.
On the other hand, It is also worth noting that the “Department of Education” received 24,403,471 social media reach, while its non-social media reach yielded over 57,157,967 non-social media reach.
Geographical reach distribution of ‘Department of Education’
Aside from the Philippines, which has reached 2,334,404 users, the following are the countries reached by the “Department of Education”:
- United States – 36,816,344
- United Kingdom – 4,340,668
- Canada – 1,398,594
- India – 818,123
- Ireland – 597,695
- Spain – 564,347
- South Africa – 560,831
- Taiwan – 513,535
- Kenya – 490,346
Sources of top posts
In terms of top posts, 64.9 percent of mentions for the “Department of Education” came from news. This means the education department was widely featured and covered by the media in the country. This was followed by the web with 11 percent, and blogs with 9.9 percent topic mentions.
The data illustrates that the week-long negative social media presence of DepEd was about the department’s involvement in other issues rooted in Duterte’s request for confidential funds and her alleged “rift” with her former running mate during the 2022 presidential and vice presidential elections.
