The Alternative Home Education Agenda for Development (A.H.E.A.D.) Program (The Marist Home Study Approach) is a functional program in education that emerges as a new frontier in response to the needs of the out-of-school youth and adults.

A.H.E.A.D. Program adopts a system offering FREE education to high school youth and adults who cannot be physically present in learning situtations or, those who are prevented from regular schooling due to poverty, chronic illness, employment duties, home responsibilities and those who have exceeded the normal school age, but are determined to complete their education.

The Notre Dame of Marbel University A.H.E.A.D. Program is an innovative approach to education which operates on the principles of self-learning and teacher-independent concepts of knowledge acquisition.

It utilizes the use of modules instead of textbooks and these are taken at the learners own pace and capacity, without them physically present in the school.

Hence, in the A.H.E.A.D. Program, the trapings of conventional study such as uniforms, daily subsistence in school, textbooks, regular attendance, are no longer barriers to one's desire to be educated.

This program that reaches out to the less previledge out-of-school youth and aults adopt a non-graded system where the learner's performance do not receive the conventional grades or ratings.

The emphasis is made on the learning and mastery of skills and not on passing grades.

The mastery of skills is determined by the achivement or mastery test through the learning facilitator's evaluation.

This mechanism of evaluating is crucial to ensure quality learning.