FACULTY leaders of the College of Nursing are confident that their stand for a retake of the leakage-marred June nursing licensure exams will be sustained by the Court of Appeals (CA).
Earlier, President Macapagal-Arroyo made an about-face on the issue and ordered a retake of the exam. Previously, she had stated there was no need for a retake.
But apparently informed that the matter had been brought to the CA by the Faculty Association of the College of Nursing (Facon) of UST, she said she would wait for the court’s decision.
“Of course I am saddened by the palace’s vacillation toward a very important matter,” Facon President Rene Tadle told the Varsitarian. “But maybe it is all right because we are confident that CA will sustain our position.”
Facon, the League of Concerned Nurses, and Samahan ng mga Student Nurses requested for a temporary restraining order (TRO) last August from the CA effectively stopping the oath-taking of the board passers. The CA is expected to render a decision on or before Oct. 18.
“The court could lift the TRO, thus allowing the oath-taking of the passers, or it could extend the TRO, or order the retake of the exams,” Tadle said.
Earlier, Commission on Filipinos Overseas Chair Dante Ang who was assigned by the President to look into the controversy, told UST Nursing students that he was for a retake of the exam.
“Retake is practically the only way to remove the stigma among this poor batch of board examiners,” Ang told the Varsitarian. “I do feel sorry for those who passed the exams with a clean slate, but this is the only solution to cleanse the Filipino nurses’ image both locally and internationally.”
Ang made his remarks after the Philippine Regulation Commission (PRC) turned down demands for a retake and even arranged for the oath-taking of some passers a day before the CA could issue its injunction.
Meanwhile, nursing faculty members have turned down the invitation of the PRC to replace the 12 members of the Board of Nursing (BON) who had resigned in the heat of the controversy.
In their letter to the PRC last Sept. 12, Nursing Dean Glenda Vargas, Asst. Dean Susan Maravilla, and professors Inocencia Ida Tionko, Zenaida Famorca and Mila Llanes refused the nomination due to PRC’s decision to proceed with the oath-taking.
“The board is supposed to regulate the entry of applicants into the nursing profession and we do not wish to occupy such a position amid a lack of confidence in the very system of regulation that the PRC and the BON are implementing,” the letter said. “The manner by which the PRC handled the leakage issue did not show good faith on the part of PRC Chair Leonor Tripon-Rosero.”
The PRC submitted more than 30 names to the Philippine Nursing Association but 19 of the nominees have declined the nominations. Andrew Isiah P. Bonifacio and Ivan Angelo L. de Lara
