MANILA — The Department of Education said Friday that it was not to blame for all errors in learning modules that have gone viral online and that it was seeking the justice department's help to go after those who falsely attribute mistakes to the agency.

DepEd has assigned more people to check modules and will tap third-party evaluators to avoid mistakes, said Education Undersecretary Diosdado San Antonio.

"Gusto ko rin pong bigyang-diin na hindi lahat ng nagiging viral sa social media ay nakikita natin na gawa ng DepED," he said in a public briefing.

(I also want to stress that not all errors that go viral on social media are by DepEd.)

One example is a module that reportedly says “O is for ostrich” and shows an owl, he said.

Out of some 800,000 module pages that the DepEd produced, the agency only validated 30 errors, he said.

The agency issued an erratum for this and continues its probe on who should be sanctioned, said San Antonio.

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DepEd has "consulted the Department of Justice on what further actions we can take" on module errors wrongly attributed to the government, Education Secretary Leonor Briones said.

"Nag-i-investigate naman kami. Na-establish namin na mayroon talagang hindi amin, pero sinasabing amin at ginagamit ang seal ng Department of Education," she said in the same briefing.

(We are investigating and we have established that there are modules that are not ours but are attributed to us and the seal of the Department of Education is being used.)

"As for sanctions, we will listen to the advice of the Department of Justice."

The DepEd rolled out blended learning -- which uses modules, online classes, and radio and television -- after President Rodrigo Duterte banned face-to-face classes to limit the spread of COVID-19.

As of Thursday, 424,297 coronavirus infections have been recorded in the country.

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