Tag: June 18, 2012

NEWLY installed Rector Fr. Herminio Dagohoy, O.P. has appointed former purchasing office director Fr. Richard Ang, O.P. as the new vice rector of the University.

“I will give my full dedication to my new job and my assignment because he [Dagohoy] has entrusted that to me,” said Ang, who succeeded Fr. Pablo Tiong, O.P.

Ang served as faculty secretary of the UST Ecclesiastical Faculties, where he finished his Bachelor in Philosophy and Masteral in Sacred Theology. He was ordained to the priesthood in 1998. NIKKA LAVINIA G. VALENZUELA

The Department of Education (DepEd) has renamed K+12 to K to 12, but it would take more than a semantic sleight of hand to redeem the ambitious program and disguise its real intention: to make the mass of Filipinos nothing more than an army of black-collar workers.

President Aquino III and Education Secretary Armin Luistro are reforming basic education by throwing billions at the public education system despite its perennial and systemic failures. This means they are putting good money after bad.

To sustain the DepEd's record of failures, it is passing the tab to higher education, which, because it's private dominated, is vastly better than the public basic education system.

LAST summer, I was overwhelmed to see a long queue that literally surrounded the Tan Yan Kee Student Center Building, only to find out that it was the last day of confirmation of program slots available for incoming freshman students.

Hopeful applicants with their parents painstakingly endured the scorching heat and the seemingly airtight space of the lobby, and instead vied for the good fortune that awaits them any moment. But after hours of tiresome waiting, a security guard with a megaphone announced past lunch time that the four available programs were already filled.

Outbursts and dismay filled the atmosphere. And the hopefuls, who mostly might have come from the provinces, went home losing their bid for Thomasian education.

FRESHMEN, welcome to the 401-year-old Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas!

Congratulations to you who have once dreamed of entering this prodigious and prestigious University. Your dreams have now materialized. Indeed, you made the right decision in studying in the oldest university in Asia.

And to those who enrolled in UST because they couldn’t afford the high tuition of elitist institutions, don’t be disheartened. Believe in the power of fate for I know God has better plans for you in UST.

Meanwhile, I also commend you for having crossed over to a new exciting chapter in life—college years.

“PROUD to be Filipino!”

It is a phrase often heard when Filipinos see a countryman recognized outside the country.

But are we, Filipinos, that desperate of international fame that we would cheer for just about anyone with even 0.01 percent of Filipino blood in their veins overseas?

This is not, however, to downplay the success of Filipinos abroad. It is reasonable to cheer for eight-time world champion Manny Pacquiao with his astonishing achievements in boxing that even non-Filipinos would cheer for, as well as others who built their name in their respective fields abroad.

But isn’t it too much for Filipinos to go head over heels for a girl who joined an American singing contest?

ISANG araw nang nakasakay ako sa jeepney, mayroong lalaking sumakay at tuloy-tuloy na nag-anunsiyo.

“Magandang umaga po, mga kapatid,” kaniyang panimula.

Agad kong naisip na paniguradong ito na naman ang mga ‘di umano’y miyembro ng isang relihiyosong grupo na gustong makalikom ng pondo, at pagkatapos ay kakanta sila ng kung anong himno.

Ngunit ako’y napaisip sa mga sumunod na winika ng lalaki.

“Kapapanaw lamang po ng aking nanay,” aniya.

Sa puntong ito, tuluyan na niyang nakuha ang aking atensiyon.

“Ito po ang kaniyang death certificate,” ani ng lalaki habang ipinapakita sa mga pasahero ang kapirasong papel. “At ako po’y humihingi ng kaunting abuloy, kung ano lamang po ang bukal sa inyong kalooban.”

WHILE UST has long been “Filipinized,” the assumption of Fr. Herminio Dagohoy, O.P. as the University’s 96th Rector consolidates the hold of Filipino Dominican friars on Asia’s oldest and only pontifical university.

Dagohoy, the seventh Filipino to hold the post, is the first incumbent prior of the Priory of St. Thomas in UST to be elected Rector Magnificus.

The Priory was originally under the Master of the Order of Preachers based in Rome, but was transferred to the Philippines following the Dominicans’ General Chapter in Caleruega, Spain in 1995. It was the first step to the turnover of UST to the Filipino Dominicans under a “climate of mutual understanding and of fraternal search for consensus.”

THE RECTOR is no king but his office has accumulated its own regalia through the years.

One of the highlights of the solemn installation of a new Rector is the bestowal of the Rector’s Collar and two ceremonial maces.

The Rector’s Collar represents the dignity of the rectorship, according to former Secretary General Fr. Florentino Bolo, Jr., O.P., master of ceremonies during the installation rites for the 96th Rector of UST, Fr. Herminio Dagohoy, O.P., last June 4 at the Santisimo Rosario Parish Church.

“The collar signifies the powers of the Vatican and the Philippine Government and it is also symbolic of the supreme teaching authority of the Rector as professor of the University,” he said.

What’s the best way to learn in this age of iPads and smart phones?

Now that the academic year has started, a good set of “studying skills” will come in handy for students about to face a deluge of requirements, deadlines, and exams.

Studying skills refer to strategies vital in improving the learning process and, ultimately, getting good grades..

Cecille Ann Pilapil, a psychology professor from the College of Science, said reading is a fundamental ability because most students are visual learners. In this respect, media and internet and the latest gadgets can help improve the learning process.

“You have an iPad, iPod, music, and thinner laptops. Tools like these become accessible to people so you learn faster,” Pilapil said.

ASTRONOMERS and enthusiasts around the world set up their telescopes and witnessed the historic transit of Venus—or its passing between the Sun and the Earth—last June 5 and 6.

A transit is rare a passage of a heavenly body, such as the inner planets Mercury and Venus, across the disk of the Sun.

“This is a rare event as the next transit will be in 2117 [or] after 105.5 years,” Dario Dela Cruz, chief of the space, science, and astronomy section of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration, told the Varsitarian.