TL;DR: CHED issued nine teacher education programme standards in a single 2017 batch, CMO 74 through CMO 83. The two big ones are BEEd (CMO 74, elementary) and BSEd (CMO 75, secondary), and that split runs all the way through to the licensure examination, which the PRC administers at Elementary and Secondary levels. The specialised programmes — early childhood, special needs, technology and livelihood, technical-vocational, physical education, culture and arts — each have their own order. Every one of them ends at the same gate: Republic Act No. 7836 requires a PRC licence before you may practise as a professional teacher.
This page routes. Each programme has its own guide on this site with unit loads and field study requirements. What follows is the whole set, what each degree qualifies you to teach, and the parts applicants most often get wrong.
The 2017 Batch
CHED rewrote teacher education in one run, adopted through the same Commission en banc process as the engineering and health standards of that year.
| Programme | CHED order | Prepares you to teach | Guide |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bachelor of Elementary Education (BEEd) | CMO 74, s. 2017 | Elementary grades, as a generalist | BEEd guide |
| Bachelor of Secondary Education (BSEd) | CMO 75, s. 2017 | Junior and senior high, in a subject major | BSEd guide |
| Bachelor of Early Childhood Education (BECEd) | CMO 76, s. 2017 | Kindergarten and early years | BECEd guide |
| Bachelor of Special Needs Education (BSNEd) | CMO 77, s. 2017 | Learners with disabilities and additional needs | BSNEd guide |
| Bachelor of Technology and Livelihood Education (BTLEd) | CMO 78, s. 2017 | Technology and livelihood education | — |
| Bachelor of Technical-Vocational Teacher Education (BTVTEd) | CMO 79, s. 2017 | Tech-voc track and TVET training | — |
| Bachelor of Physical Education (BPEd) | CMO 80, s. 2017 | Physical education | BPEd guide |
| Bachelor of Culture and Arts Education (BCAEd) | CMO 82, s. 2017 | Culture and arts education | — |
| Post Baccalaureate Diploma in Alternative Learning System | CMO 83, s. 2017 | ALS delivery, for existing degree holders | — |
CMO 81, series of 2017 covers BS Exercise and Sports Sciences, which sits in the same run of orders but is not a teacher education programme. It prepares graduates for fitness, coaching and sports science work rather than classroom teaching, and it does not lead to the teachers' board. Applicants who want to teach PE need BPEd, not BSESS. Getting this backwards costs four years.
Elementary or Secondary Decides More Than It Looks
The BEEd/BSEd choice is not a preference about age group. It determines the licensure examination you sit and the positions you may hold.
BEEd trains generalists. An elementary teacher handles the full curriculum for a class rather than one subject across many classes.
BSEd trains subject specialists. You carry a major — English, Filipino, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies, Values Education and so on — and teach it across year levels. Which majors a school actually offers varies enormously; a university listing eight majors may staff four properly.
The PRC administers the Licensure Examination for Teachers at Elementary and Secondary levels, and the level you take follows the degree. Changing your mind after graduating means additional coursework, not a form. Our BEEd guide and BSEd guide go through the coursework difference in detail.
The Specialised Programmes
BECEd (CMO 76) covers the early years. This is distinct from a childcare qualification — it is a full teacher education degree with the same professional education spine.
BSNEd (CMO 77) is the special needs programme, and it sits inside a policy environment that changed with Republic Act No. 11650, the law on inclusive education for learners with disabilities. Demand for qualified special needs teachers is structural rather than cyclical. See our BSNEd guide and the wider piece on special education in the Philippines.
BTLEd (CMO 78) and BTVTEd (CMO 79) are two different degrees that get conflated constantly, including by schools. Confirm the exact title on the diploma.
BTVTEd is worth setting out properly because it has a feature no other teacher education degree has. CMO 79 describes it as an undergraduate teacher education programme equipping learners "with adequate and relevant competencies in teaching specific area in Industrial Arts or Home Economics or ICT or Agri-Fishery Arts — the four areas of technical and vocational track in the K to 12 Curriculum." Its graduates are prepared to be Grade 9-10 TLE teachers, senior high school teachers for the Tech-Voc Livelihood track, TVET trainers and instructors, and higher education faculty.
The distinguishing clause: CMO 79 states that graduates of BTVTEd "are considered to have satisfied the TESDA requirement for Trainers' Methodology." That is a second credential pathway built into the degree, and it is why BTVTEd graduates can move between the school system and TESDA-registered training centres.
The unit structure under CMO 79 is 173 units total — 36 general education, 54 professional education with additional technical-vocational allied courses, 69 major courses, 8 physical education and 6 NSTP — plus 240 hours of supervised industrial training in areas related to the specialisation. That industrial training requirement is real work placement, not a school-based practicum, and it is the part to ask about before you enrol.
BPEd (CMO 80) is physical education teaching. Note that tertiary PE itself was restructured by CMO No. 39, series of 2021, which put the PATHFIT courses in place across all higher education programmes — relevant context if you are going to teach in that space. See the BPEd guide.
BCAEd (CMO 82) covers culture and arts education. It is offered by comparatively few institutions.
The Post Baccalaureate Diploma in ALS (CMO 83) is not an entry-level degree. It is for people who already hold a bachelor's and want to work in the Alternative Learning System. If that is your interest, read our ALS guides first.
The LET Is the Gate for All of Them
Every route above converges here.
Republic Act No. 7836, the Philippine Teachers Professionalization Act of 1994, requires a valid certificate of registration and a valid professional licence from the Commission before any person may practise as a professional teacher in the Philippines. The examination is given by the Board for Professional Teachers under the PRC. Republic Act No. 9293 amended the Act, including on the routes available to non-education graduates.
Two practical points.
The level follows the degree. BEEd graduates sit the elementary level, BSEd graduates the secondary level. Applicants from the specialised programmes should confirm with the PRC which level applies to their degree rather than assuming.
Passing rates are a school-level statistic, not a programme-level one. The spread between institutions on the LET is far wider than the spread between degree types. Our roundup of education schools by LET passing rate shows it, and our guides to LET application requirements and passing the LET first try cover the exam itself. PRC publishes the exact dates and filing windows in its annual schedule of licensure examinations — that resolution is the only calendar worth planning against.
For the wider path from enrolment to DepEd employment, see how to become a teacher in the Philippines.
The Policy Layer Above the Degrees
Two laws changed the environment these programmes sit in.
Republic Act No. 11713, the Excellence in Teacher Education Act, approved 27 April 2022, is titled "An Act Further Strengthening Teacher Education in the Philippines by Enhancing the Teacher Education Council, Establishing a Scholarship Program" and related measures. Republic Act No. 10533, the Enhanced Basic Education Act, is the K to 12 law the 2017 programme standards were written to serve — the CHED orders align themselves explicitly to it and to the Philippine Professional Standards for Teachers.
On the employment side, Republic Act No. 11997 provides the teaching allowance, and DepEd sets hiring criteria separately from CHED and the PRC. Our guides on DepEd teacher hiring requirements and teacher salary cover the part that starts after the licence.
Choosing a Programme
Start from the grade level and subject you actually want to teach. Everything else follows from that. The degree, the licensure level and your DepEd application category are all downstream of it.
Check which majors a school truly staffs. For BSEd this is the single most important question. Ask how many full-time faculty hold graduate degrees in the major you want, not how many majors appear in the prospectus.
Ask where field study and teaching internship happen. The cooperating schools a programme uses shape your practical training and, often, your first job. This applies double for BTVTEd, where 240 hours of supervised industrial training has to be arranged with real employers.
Look at the LET record of that specific school. It is the closest available proxy for teaching quality and it is published. If you are still in senior high, our note on the right strand for teaching covers the preparation side.
Sources
- Commission on Higher Education — 2017 CHED Memorandum Orders (full list of issuances, including CMO 74 to CMO 83)
- CHED — CMO No. 79, s. 2017, Policies, Standards and Guidelines for the Bachelor of Technical-Vocational Teacher Education (BTVTEd) (PDF)
- CHED — CMO No. 74, s. 2017, Policies, Standards and Guidelines for the Bachelor of Elementary Education (BEEd) (PDF)
- CHED — CMO No. 75, s. 2017, Policies, Standards and Guidelines for the Bachelor of Secondary Education (BSEd) (PDF)
- Commission on Higher Education — 2021 CHED Memorandum Orders, including CMO No. 39 on tertiary Physical Education PATHFIT courses
- LawPhil — Republic Act No. 7836, Philippine Teachers Professionalization Act of 1994
- LawPhil — Republic Act No. 11713, Excellence in Teacher Education Act, approved 27 April 2022
- Professional Regulation Commission — List of Professional Regulatory Boards
