Hi there! It’s another weekend and news had it that the ceasefire at the Gaza strip has ceased (any yun? Parang redundant?). Well, should I say it happens? As I have mentioned in this column many weeks ago, it’s about bad blood that predates Jesus Christ. There’s not much we can do about it, don’t you think? Okey, let’s see what Mr. Obama can do. If he will follow tradition, regardless if he succeeds to turn the American economy around or not, he will pursue peace in the Middle East as a legacy when he becomes a lameduck President.
And another year in college? (And yes, Spanish in high school?) I am no authority in coming up with policies on education (read: am just a lowly education degree holder. No doctorate degrees or what have you, but I can certainly speak better English compared to some Doctors I know. Oops, me and my mouth). I was not able to get the clear explanation as to the reason why the need to add another year in college. But if it is for the plain and simple purpose of being able to produce better students, I think we should go back to the basics, the foundation. A good number of my students (in college) do not know what a pronoun is. Do I have to include someone who pronounced neptune as “neptoone”? And then there are those who didn’t know that a declarative sentence is. And yes, I’m still looking for the 3 essays which showed how uninspiring the English of some college students are. I’ll feature these in this column as soon as I get hold of it. And yes, I have encountered students who get teary-eyed when asked to rise and recite in class. So, another year in college? Nah! As to the Spanish subject, hmm, sounds interesting.
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GILAS in Calbayog. Gearing up Internet Literacy and Access to Students (GILAS) is a program of the Ayala Foundation. As the name of the program suggests, it aims at connecting the public high schools of the Philippines via the internet.The City government has tied-up with the said foundation and at the moment, we have 8 National High School in Calbayog connected via the internet. These schools are:
- Calbayog City National High School
- Mag-ubay National High School
- Oquendo National High School
- Pilar Agricultural High School
- Rafael Lentejas Memorial School of Fisheries (Tinambacan)
- San Policarpo National High School
- Tarabucan National High School
- Trinidad National High School
Still to be connected are San Joaquin and Malaga National High Schools. Both schools are located in Tinambacan District.
On the last week of January, Mayor Mel Sarmiento together with Mario Deriquito and Dino Rey Abellano of the Ayala Foundation and DepEd officials led by Mrs. Edita Paculan met for the program dubbed as "Celebration of Gilas milestone in Calbayog City: Connecting 100% of Connectible Public High Schools". The said program was held at the DepEd Calbayog Conference Hall. After the messages were delivered, the GILAS School Recipients represented by Lolita Alera gave a message of commitment. Guests then proceeded to the Calbayog City National High School for a Tele-Conference (or chat, in internet lingo) with some teachers and students from the National High Schools in Pilar, Tarabucan and Mag-ubay. The same schools were visited by the guests after the Tele-Conference.
The importance of this project cannot be overemphasized. Students in the schools especially in Tarabucan, Pilar and Mag-ubay - barangays that do not have telephone connection - now use their school computers not only to encode their projects but as tools to research and explore the unlimited data that can be had via the internet.
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Rural Bank of Calbayog City is 50 years old. Tomorrow’s celebration will include a Thanksgiving mass and a Dinner at the Centennial Pastoral Center.
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This is it for now. Have a nice weekend everyone!
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