Embracing traditional and digital learning solutions
Rex Book Store’s Danda Buhain-Garcia on ‘holistic learning’ as key to staying ahead in the education market
One challenge that the schools and universities of today face is the speed with which technology is changing their classrooms, as well as the teachers and pupils who occupy them. Millennial students who grew up with a smart device in their hand find it a chore to sit through a straightforward PowerPoint-aided lecture.
Rex Book Store in PSE Condominium (Tektite Tower) in Ortigas, Pasig
Teachers in turn have to keep up with the flow of information, as these younger minds can challenge their lessons within a few seconds of a Google search. Online courses and academies are sprouting to offer new skill sets and knowledge that may be useful today but irrelevant tomorrow.
While education provider Rex Book Store Inc. is likewise going the digital way, it keeps its focus on the holistic, and not just the cognitive needs, of its target audiences, and encourages and supports their growth as communities. These include its primary market of students that’s inextricably linked to teachers.
“The profiles of today’s learners are changing. So are the thrusts of the different schools which have different segmentations and desired outcomes,” acknowledges Danda Buhain-Garcia, Rex’s managing director and the granddaughter of the founder. “We have to be able to respond to them. The content has to be meaningful to the end-user. The design of our product is purposefully thought of in order to land securely on the child or teacher who sees it.”
While it might have started out 70 years ago as a small kiosk that peddled second-hand books in the street that is now known as Recto Avenue, Rex is now a content developer that publishes and distributes its own authored textbooks that cater to a wide range of learners from the pre-school to the tertiary level. More than 30 years ago, it created a solid brand as the go-to provider of law textbooks. Since then, it has branched out to digital learning solutions and hands-on programs that allow a child to learn through experiment and the experiential.
Rex Book Store managing director Danda Buhain-Garcia
Continuing research that focuses on the learner’s different ways of learning is critical to design. “Each child’s profile is different,” Buhain-Garcia elaborates. “Some absorb lessons when taught through linguistics, while others understand better when done through dance, for example. Learning should be personalized and customized. We have assessment materials that show us how to pivot and navigate for various groups of learners. One group might be more advanced in their learning, others are slower, while others are more motivated to learn.”
The teachers remain an integral part in Rex’s journey with the child or student. Many of them do author the company’s textbooks as part-time content developers. Through a series of workshops and programs like the Resource for Educators and Academic Professionals (REAP), the company enhances the knowledge and skills of their teachers through workshops and training courses in subjects like child psychology and science literacy.
As with all enterprises, talent retention remains a challenge, especially when greener pastures beckon. To keep them motivated, especially the textbook authors, Buhain-Garcia has to be flexible enough to allow a change in tone, shifting from its “cerebral and straightforward” trademark to a more playful and lighter one. Yet Rex’s more effective strategy would be appealing to the teacher’s inner passion to educate a mind.
Aside from the training, Buhain-Garcia says that one scenario they emphasize to teachers is the extent of their reach. “As teachers in a classroom, they can only touch a certain number of students,” she says. “but through the books they write and publish, they become instrumental in the learning of an even greater number of students who read them, some of whom they might not even meet.”
Ultimately, what makes their stakeholders loyal is the application of principles that the Rex founders had stood for all their lives, and which they had passed on to their children and grandchildren. The teachers, children, and the 900-strong workforce are treated as family who are cared for and watched over. Transparency and accountability, especially in the way that partners and personnel alike are regarded, are non-negotiable.
Buhain-Garcia says that these core values helped her forebears through troubled times and made Rex strong for 70 years – and they likewise form the legacy that she and her brother, Don Timothy Buhain, who is the company’s COO, live by today. “We can’t complain because our parents and grandparents had a harder time than we did,” she muses.
“My father watched the original store burn down as a fire was razing it. He slept on the sidewalk that night, all his assets gone. The only book that survived intact and whole was the ‘Jesus, Save Me’ novena – and that gave him the push to continue. We stick to what we believe in. If your intentions remain pure, God will not let you down.”
As new horizons open up into more innovative kinds of learning areas, the granddaughter of the founder who as a poor young boy “walked to his school barefoot” cannot ask for more.
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