FOREWORD

The SLU Academic Session 2001 has three highlights: firstly, the confer-

ment of the University�s honorary degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, to

Attorney Rafael E. Evangelista; secondly, the signing of the Memorandum of

Agreement for the Consortium on MS in Civil Engineering between Saint Louis

University and Baguio Colleges Foundation; and, finally, the University Address

of Rev. Fr. Paul Van Parijs, CICM, SLU President.

The lone recipient of the University�s honorary degree this year, Atty. Rafael

E. Evangelista, is an accomplished lawyer, educator, businessman, humanist and

philantrophist. Traces of all these that he is are very much discernible in his ac-

ceptance speech, �The Land of Bondage, Land of the Free - Revisited.�

SLU and BCF, two of the leading institutions offering Civil Engineering

(as seen in their consistent high rates of licensure board passers), have forged a

Memorandum of Agreement for a Consortium on MS Civil Engineering, the first

of its kind in Northern Luzon. The message of the President of the Baguio Col-

leges Foundation spells out the rationale behind the agreement and expresses

much assurance on the success of the collaborative project.

Capping the whole affair, the University President�s Address, �SLU at

the Turn of a New Millennium,� largely highlights the University�s yearlong de-

velopment after a short introductory exhortation towards fidelity to the Univer-

sity�s vision/mission. The address positively concludes with words of gratitude

for all the good things that have been, as well as with words of hope for brighter

days ahead for the whole SLU community. !

CONTENTS

" " FOREWORD

1 " LAUDATIO IN HONOR OF ATTORNEY RAFAEL E. EVANGELISTA

BY DR. ALEJANDRO ROCES

CHAIRMAN, SLU BOARD OF TRUSTEES

2 " " ACCEPTANCE SPEECH: "LAND OF BONDAGE,

LAND OF THE FREE � REVISITED

(WITH DUE APOLOGIES TO THE LATE SENATOR RAUL S. MANGLAPUS)"

BY ATTORNEY RAFAEL E. EVANGELISTA

DOCTOR OF LAWS, HONORIS CAUSA

10 " A MESSAGE ON THE OCCASION OF THE SIGNING

OF THE MEMORANDUM OF AGREEMENT FOR THE CONSORTIUM

ON M.S. IN CIVIL ENGINEERING WITH SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY

DR. RICARDO P. PAMA

PRESIDENT, BAGUIO COLLEGES FOUNDATION

13 " UNIVERSITY ADDRESS: "SLU AT THE TURN OF A NEW MILLENNIUM"

BY REV. FR. PAUL VAN PARIJS, CICM

PRESIDENT, SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY

Rafael E. Evangelista � lawyer, educator,bus inessman , human is t andphilantrophist.

As a lawyer, the common welfare of all was hissupreme law.

As an educator, he lived up to its root word e-ducere, which means to lead forth and bring out thefull potentiality of every individual. He realizes thateducation is the only ultimate solution to all ournational problems and the world�s quest for free-

Dr. Alejandro RocesChairman

SLU Board of Trustees

IN HONOR OFATTORNEY RAFAEL E.

EVANGELISTA

1

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dom.

As a businessman, he was aware of the na-tion�s needs during our times.

As a humanist, he placed duty to man as hisway of complying with his duties to God.

His philantrophism is clear proof that he wasnot born for himself, but for his countrymen and allof mankind.

Albert Schweitzer said, �Example is not the mainthing � it is the only thing.� Rafael E. Evangelista isa great example of patriotism. He always caredand did what he could for the disadvantaged anddispossessed. May others follow his footsteps. !!!!

L u a ioa d tLaudatioLaudatioLaudatio

Chairman, Dr. Alejandro Roces, President,Fr. Paul Van Parijs, the board of trustees,faculty members, ladies and gentlemen:

Thank you for the honor you have conferredon me today. I accept this doctorate on behalf ofthe many Filipinos, who during the events of thepast few months quietly, yet forcefully, made theirvoices heard and became agents of sweepingchange in our country.

Many Filipinos are asking �Why, despite theSupreme Court decision against Erap, does hecontinue to be popular with the masses?�

Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo declared, three daysafter she became President, that �The poor are notthe problem; they are part of the solution.� Ournew President�s statement is significant, because itimplicitly addresses the question of the masa�scontinued support of Erap.

A student, named Raul S. Manglapus, presagedthese views of President Macapagal-Arroyo aboutseventy years ago. In an elocution piece called�Land of Bondage, Land of the Free,� with a wis-dom far beyond his years, he spoke of the Span-iard taking the land away from the Tao, and theTao starving. He spoke of the Tao driving the Span-iard away. He spoke of the land having another

master, his own countryman grown rich. Then heconcluded that the Tao was still a prisoner in hisown country.

Manglapus then asked on behalf of the Tao:

Who dares rise up in judgment against theTao? The Tao does not come to be judged� but to judge � You accuse me of igno-rance � Free me from bondage and I shallprove you false � If you will not grant methis my last request � then build a wallaround your home � place a sentry on everyparapet � for I who have been silent these300 years will come in the night � with mycry and my bolo at your door. And mayGod have mercy on your soul!

Senator Manglapus� speech as a student is thepremise that I would like to use in my remarkstoday.

As we did in 1986, so did we recently in 2001celebrate a new opportunity to re-anchor our shipof state on the tenets of honesty, integrity, and com-mitment to true public service. But the miracles ofEdsa I and II are not simply that we got rid of adictator and a thief. If this is our conclusion, wemiss the point of the divine intervention that oc-curred at Edsa.

Rizal warned us about the bondage of the Taobefore Manglapus did. In the fifties, DiosdadoMacapagal, in advocating land reform, warned that

Attorney Rafael E. EvangelistaDoctor of LawsHonoris Causa

2

LAND OF BONDAGE, LANDOF THE

FREE � REVISITED(With due apologies to the late Senator

Raul S. Manglapus)

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c p c eAc e tan e SpAcceptance Spe cAcceptance SpeechAcceptance Speech

the farmer had to be emancipated from bondage.In the sixties, activists called for the liberation ofthe migrant workers from the sacadas system. Asrecently as this year, Washington Sycip, warnedbusinessmen about the bondage of the masses.We have had more than ample warning aboutbondage, the real problem of our country!

Think about it. All the elements of a classstruggle, similar to what Karl Marx wrote about inhis book, Das Kapital, exist today in Philippinesociety. Some of these are:

� 1 out of every 3 Filipino families is offi-cially classified as very poor.

� Out of 32 million able-bodied Filipinos, 4million are without jobs, and 6.5 millionmore are working but are not earningenough.

� If the government creates 1 million qualityjobs a year, the effort would take 10 yearsto overcome the present unemploymentproblem.

� The minimum wage for one month is barelyenough to buy the basic commodity needsfor a family of 5 for 1 week.

These statistics tell us that the real miracle of

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Edsa I and II, by the grace of God, is that somehowclass war has not yet erupted in our midst.

Certain fundamental forces must be in placeto break the chains of bondage, certainly the landthat Manglapus spoke about, but more speciallyeducation. Education can provide the means toacquire jobs and land; education can lead to em-powerment; education can lead to good govern-ance; all of which are absolutely essential to theliberation of the Tao.

But as Confucius has said, �In education thereshould be no class distinction.� About class dis-tinction in education, I ask you certain basic ques-tions:

� Is education today available to the broadermasses of the poor?

� Is it affordable?� Is it accessible to most?� Is it adequate to equip the masa with the

necessary intellectual and emotional toolsto support and improve their lives?

The answers are evident. Education is not avail-able to the greater number of the poor, is not af-fordable nor is it accessible. And even where ac-

4

cessible, education is limited to the high schoollevel at best. College is not even an option forthem.

I would like to discuss what a group that in-cludes your Chairman, Dr. Roces, and myself isdoing about the problem of affordability and ac-cessibility of college education. There is an insti-tution called CAP College, which is an affiliate ofthe College Assurance Plan. CAP College was or-ganized eleven years ago to make collegiate edu-cation accessible through distance education to thefarmer, the fisherman, the soldier, the policeman,the prisoner, the overseas worker, the housewife,the government employee, and to all those whofor various reasons cannot come to the cities fortheir college degrees. In our vision, CAP�s officesnationwide would serve as tutorial and reviewcenters. CAP�s radio network would assist in theimplementation of our modules for distance edu-cation. With these support facilities, distanceeducation could play a substantial role in makingeducation more accessible.

But we also understood that even if accessible,we also needed to make education affordable.Profit would not be the primary goal of CAP Col-lege. The institution had to be an instrument forcreating, �a new middle class.� It would establish afund for deserving but poor scholars so that theycould enroll under our distance education pro-grams for free. The concept was simple. With astanding fund, the idea was to graduate collegescholars from the interest earning of the fund.Hundreds or maybe thousands would then risefrom the ranks of the marginal to the ranks of themiddle class, all graduating without having to paytuition, without leaving the places were they live orwork.

Ever since the �Dear CAP Scholarship Fund�was established, scholarships for the impoverishedhave been financed to the tune of P30 million peracademic year. The program has tie-ups with 51provinces, 36 municipalities, 6 government agen-cies, 23 NGOs and special groups.

Some of these special groups are 1200 pris-oners of the Bureau of Corrections in Muntinlupa;105 policemen located from Manila to GeneralSantos City; 136 children of soldiers wounded orkilled in battle; teachers in rural areas wishing toobtain their graduates degrees; street children; laharand disaster victims; the physically impaired and

the underprivileged. Today, the fund has a total of2,842 scholar-beneficiaries from the very poor butvery deserving.

But it is in the untapped potential of the pro-gram where the real promise lies. College Assur-ance Plan Philippines has about 50,000 sales ad-visors located nationwide. What if each sales ad-visor could be utilized to locate just 1 indigentscholar from every barangay? That would mean50,000 scholars in place in the countrysides. Itboggles my mind to think of what might be if othersimilar-minded corporations and members of theprivileged class would lend their support andmoney to distance education for the upliftment ofthe poor.

I can think of many benefits if all that comesto pass, but let me focus on one. A broader mid-dle class could mean more entrepreneurs. Moreentrepreneurs could mean more jobs. It wouldmean more work, more jobs in place out there inthe countryside.

One other question on education should alsobe asked, �Should the rich and the powerful be re-educated on the necessity of addressing the prob-lem of the Tao�s bondage?� The process of na-tional reformation through education would remainincomplete without it. It is rather simplistic foranyone to conclude that a significant portion ofthe masa continue to support Erap simply becauseof ignorance, indolence, the dazzle of show busi-ness, the tolerance for bribery or the acceptance oflargesse.

I believe the larger segment of the impover-ished know and care about the problem, but wedon�t. The masa are not with us because we havechosen to ignore the need to provide them withthe education and other tools that can help themhelp themselves. We have kept the poor in bond-age because we support a culture that does notallow the broad mass of our people to cope withand prosper in life.

Why then should the masses join in our clamorfor political change? Erap at least went throughthe pretension of identifying with them. Remem-ber his battlecry, �Erap Para sa Mahirap?� Remem-ber the times when he ate with the masa with hishands? We said that this was Erap�s penchant formelodrama, like the movies he starred in, that theeating and feeding of the masa with Erap�s hands

5

was unsanitary, and that we were above all that.Well, what did we do in Makati? We held our ownsalubungan with the farmers and the fishermen,and fed them pack lunches with plastic spoons andforks. You know what some of our less privilegedfriends said? �Parang sinampal ninyo angkahirapan namin sa aming mukha!�. And whenasked why, our friends responded �kasi hindinamin kaya bumili ng plastik kutsara at tinidor!�We cannot impose the use of plastic spoons andforks on the poor any more than we can imposeour solutions on the problem of the Tao�s bond-age. The solution must involve the poor, not asrecipients or mendicants, but as active participants.Education will allow them to become active par-ticipants!

If people like Rizal, Manglapus, Macapagal andSycip have warned us to liberate the Tao frombondage, can we do any less? If and when we needa third miracle at Edsa, God, in His divine wis-dom, may decide to unleash instead the dogs ofwar upon us. Then the prediction of Manglapuswill come to pass, and the Tao may come in thenight with his cry and his bolo to win his freedomfrom bondage.

H.G. Wells in his work, The Outline of His-tory, wrote �Human history becomes more andmore a race between education and catastrophe.�Another wise man also said, �Education makes a

people � easy to govern, but impossible to enslave.�

In Edsa I, the theme song was �Bayan Ko.� InEdsa II, �Bayan Ko� was sang, but a second songfrom the musical version of Victor Hugo�s �LesMiserables� was heard as well. A verse of that songreads as follows:

Do you hear the people singSinging the song of angry men?It is the music of the peopleWho will not be slaves again.When the beating of your heartsEchoes the beating of the drumsThere�s a life about to start when tomorrowcomes.

There is a significant difference between themessage of Edsa I and that of Edsa II, a warningthat we should heed. The song of Edsa I is a beau-tiful but melancholy lament about a captive birdyearning to be free. The song of Edsa II is a mili-tant poem about a people marching to freedom.

I pray that God give us the wisdom to discernthis shift in moods and the will to respond to it,before it is too late. We must heed the warningnow!

Maraming salamat at magandang hapon sainyong lahat! !

Our distinguished guest, Attorney andnow Doctor of Laws Rafael E.Evangelista, Rev. Fr. Paul Van Parijs,

and his co-officials in SLU, Members of theBoard of Trustees, Heads and Delegates ofSchools, other officers of SLU, members ofthe faculty and other employees, guests,ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon.

For us Filipinos, the year 2020 is signifi-cant, as this is the year when the Philippinesconsented to move towards the Asia PacificEconomic Cooperation or APEC agreed traderegime.

It is imperative that in the years leadingto 2020 the Philippine economy will need tochange and develop so that our enterprisescan be competitive in the regional and globalmarket. The Philippine will need to developits resources carefully with a view to the longterm. And what is the Philippines� mostvaluable resource? It is the skills, abilitiesand determination of its people. YoungFilipinos must be provided the necessaryknowledge and skills to prepare them to join

Dr. Ricardo P. PamaPresident

Baguio Colleges Foundation

6

ON THE OCCASION OF THESIGNING OF THE MEMORANDUM

OF AGREEMENT FOR THECONSORTIUM ON M.S. IN CIVIL

ENGINEERING WITH SAINT LOUISUNIVERSITY

"

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the work force and to reskill and upskillthose already in the workplace to enablethem to meet technological changes andchanging markets.

The increased regional and global compe-tition which the Philippines will face willrequire a substantial level of professional andvocational training related to best practiceand quality. More and more training will beintegrated with initiatives designed to improveand demonstrate quality processes and man-agement.

The issues outlined above illustrate therange and diversity of the challenge to whichthe Philippine�s educational institutions mustrespond. It must do so in realistic ways,recognizing the diversity of the needs of thevarious regions and the limits which will existin human, financial, and physical resources.

Why has the concern for quality in highereducation emerged as a public agenda through-out the world? More importantly, how caneducational institutions achieve quality withinthe demands of the new economy? Overthe past decades, professional associations inmany parts of the world have been preoccu-pied with the issues of quality in education.Few topics elicit greater alarm in higher

s aMe s geMessageMessageMessage

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education than productivity and quality, andrarely is productivity linked with quality. Cur-rently, academic administrators in many partsof the world particularly in Europe and theUnited States are experiencing the reality andpain of restructuring higher education. Theyare concerned and are searching for answerswhich will allow proactive leaders to shapethis changing process while protecting aca-demic freedom in teaching, research, andoutreach activities. Regardless of how proactiveor reactive one is on this issue, one overarchingbelief is held in high regard: institutions ofhigher education must graduate individualswell prepared for their respective careers androles within the new global economy. Thefundamental message to all academic admin-istrators and faculty is simple: commit yourselfto the collective responsibility of achieving anew kind of quality in higher educationwhich satisfies the customers (students andtheir parents) as well as the employers whoemploy these graduates.

One thing is certain: for Philippine indus-tries to survive the regional and global com-petition, we need good quality manpower.This is the challenge for our colleges anduniversities in the Philippines: Can we pro-duced quality manpower that can competeregionally and globally in this century?

Since the thrust now is to competeglobally and produce quality manpower, thelack of resources in colleges and universitiesmust be addressed. I firmly believe thatinstead of competing with one another, weshould collaborate, complement, and poolour resources together in order to attain ourgoals and objectives in meeting and address-ing the issues in the new global economy.

Thus, in the field of civil engineering,Saint Louis University and Baguio CollegesFoundation agreed on a consortium of re-sources to start in June 2001. It is to benoted that very few tertiary institutions oflearning in the Philippines are offering the

8

program Master of Science in Civil Engineering.

The signing of the Memorandum of agree-ment or MOA today is historic event. If theprogram succeeds, we hope to expand it toother fields.

The other issue that we must consider isthat quality improvement systems so boldlyembraced by industries must be adapted byour colleges and universities. We mustrecognize that in the end, the success of aneducational institution depends on the qualityof its graduates. The demands of the newglobal economy will compel university leadersworldwide to search for better ways tomanage and improve the quality of ourhigher education system. We have to askand answer the questions �How well are wedoing our jobs� and �How can we do thembetter in the future?� Those who under-stand the significance of these questionsand how to find the answers to themshould come forward and lead us in this

twenty-first century.

Our colleges and universities are the braintrust of our society. They are critical to oureconomic prosperity as well as protecting ourdemocratic processes. The challenge andresponsibility of the leaders of higher educa-tion in this country is to educate andgraduate quality students while reaffirming thefaith in the principle of academic freedomand institutional autonomy: the ultimate basisfor world�class standards in higher education.When the vision to improve the learningprocess is shared by the students, faculty andadministrators; when faculty members arerewarded for classroom performance as wellas research and community services, andwhen the leadership supports this visionthrough a clearly defined mission and institu-tional goals, the quality improvement systemwill grow and become firmly embeddedwithin the halls and classrooms of academia.Thank you and good day!!

School Year 1999-2000 straddled the 20th andthe 21st century. We were at a turning point. Welooked at where we came from and tried to

peep around the corner to see what was ahead. Thispresent School Year 2000-2001 brought us fullyaround the curve on a new straight stretch. It is timeto thoroughly study the road ahead of us, examinethe equipment we have at hand and determine howhard we can hit the road.

Catholic Identity Re-affirmed: A ContinuingChallenge

Last February, SLU hosted the ACUP Forum, agathering of the Association of Catholic Universitiesin the Philippines. For two days the delegates ex-changed around the topic of the Catholic identity oftheir universities. It is a recurring exercise as it is anongoing challenge to respond to our vision/missionas Catholic Institutions of Higher Learning.

Pope John Paul II wrote in 1990 an importantdocument on the issue, entitled �Ex Corde Ecclesiae�or �Born from the Heart of the Church.� On thetopic of identity and mission, he states: �Every CatholicUniversity, as a university, is an academic communitywhich, in a rigorous and critical fashion, assists in the

Rev. Fr. Paul Van Parijs, CICMSLU President

9

SLU AT THE START OF ANEW MILLENNIUM

protection and advancement of human dignity andof a cultural heritage through research, teaching andvarious services offered to the local, national and in-ternational communities.� And he continues: �Sincethe objective of a Catholic University is to assure in aninstitutional manner a Christian presence in the univer-sity world confronting the great problems of societyand culture, every Catholic University, as Catholic, musthave the following essential characteristics:

1. a Christian inspiration not only of individualsbut of the university community as such;

2. a continuing reflection in the light of theCatholic faith upon the growing treasury ofhuman knowledge, to which it seeks to con-tribute by its own research;

3. fidelity to the Christian message as it comesto us through the Church;

4. an institutional commitment in the service ofthe people of God and of the human familyin their pilgrimage to the transcendent goalwhich gives meaning to life.�

These are rich words, brave words, challengingwords. We probably have heard them so many timesthat maybe they have lost their meaning for us. But ifwe want to grasp the meaning of the Catholic charac-ter of the Catholic university that we are, should be,and are meant to be, we need to go back to thesewords again and again, understand them, live them,and see if they are real in our own campus and aboveall in our own lives.

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The �Covenant of the Heart� of which I spokerepeatedly in the past is what we need to keep alive inorder to truly retain our identity and vision as a Catholicuniversity. The Covenant of the Heart is not a pledgewe make individually at a given moment in time, whenwe sign our appointment papers in the institution wejoin. The Covenant of the Heart is a journey we makein Saint Louis University, individually and as a com-munity, over the years, with courage and persever-ance, in faith and in hope, in good days and in baddays, in joy and in tears, until �retirement day. It is anever ending challenge but also the source of deepjoy and happiness and blessings. Aapaw ang atingkagalakan at kaligayahan kung walang tigil at buongpuso at diwa ang ating paglilingkod sa ating mahal napamantasan at sa mga kabataan ng Hilagang Luzon.

Dear Friends, before turning to a summary ofhappenings and achievements of our Louisian com-munity during school year 2000-2001, I wanted toremind you of our vision/mission and our identity atthe start of this new millennium. The Covenant ofthe Heart is 89 years old but hopefully still going strong!

Now I will briefly touch on different areas ofour operation: academic, administrative, financial andon some development plans.

Academic Notes

Each time I represent SLU in meetings here andabroad or while receiving visitors in my office, I re-mind those inquiring about SLU of the existence ofour SLU Website. Engineer Peralta and his MIS crewhave been working hard at developing, expanding andupdating our Website. The Website www.slu.edu.phoffers a wide range of informative materials on thedifferent sectors that compose our university and onthe various activities that characterize our educationalmastodon.

I would like to invite each and everyone to occa-sionally access this rich source of information and givefeedback to the Webmaster. Some of you may haveadditional useful information to present; some of youmay even discover inaccuracies or typos, or they mayhave updated data to pass on. Please feel free to pes-

11

ter the Webmaster. Just keep in mind, you cannot pullhis hair.

Let me give you a few examples of useful infor-mation you will find on the SLU Website. If you wishto know which graduate programs are offered in thedifferent Colleges, just click on the appropriate header.If you wish to know how well SLU is doing aca-demically, visit the site giving a survey of the boardand licensure exam results of the past 5 years. In thelatter case you may discover that SLU is doing ex-tremely well, a fact publicly acknowledged by the PRC,the Professional Regulation Commission. If you wishto download some pictures of our campus and passthem on to friends, again, go to the Website.

Any university worth its salt should not just excelin teaching, it ought to have a decent library, an activeresearch program, and a meaningful outreach � animpact on its surroundings.

For the past two years, SLU together with BSUhas enjoyed a partnership with the Flemish universi-ties, known as the VLIR. In January the different Flem-ish coordinators of this partnership have been with usto evaluate the results of two years �partnering.� Theyhave expressed high satisfaction with the resultsachieved so far. Some of these results are visible andtangible, others are more hidden but not less real. OurIT setup keeps expanding and improving. The libraryis presently undergoing a major overhaul, a long-rangejob. More difficult than the automation of the libraryare the re-organization of the different sectors of thelibrary and the development of a true library cultureamong faculty and students alike.

The most visible and tangible result of the part-nership is the rapid faculty development, the manyscholars going for advanced degrees. The first batchof scholars, 18 of them, are about to finish their spe-cial studies, another batch of 13 is about to start thiscoming school year.

I would like to express my appreciation to all thosewho keep the partnership going, our local coordina-tors and our foreign partners. The paperwork and thereporting involved may be tedious but it is worth theeffort.

Research is slowly but steadily moving forward.

By now you may have noticed the activities of theNSRU and their publication on Cordillera lichens.Some may also be familiar with the work of Dr. CarlosMedina in the CRDF.

Less known maybe is the twinning between SLUand FEU College of Medicine, intended to developthe research capabilities of our SLU College of Medi-cine. It is part of a project of the Philippine Councilfor Health research and Development of the DOST.

As I said a while ago, research is slowly but stead-ily moving at SLU.

On the academic level, there is another develop-ment I would like to mention.

In response to a PAASCU recommendation foraccreditation, the administration has decided to stepup the globalization of the general education courses,effective first semester of school year 2001-2002.

PAASCU requires that at least 35% of the generaleducation courses be taught by faculty with a gradu-ate degree. And there should be matching betweenthe subject taught and the degree � of course.

Accreditation of the various degree programs inSLU will be facilitated with the globalization of thegeneral education or liberal arts courses. With the gen-eral education or liberal arts courses accredited forthe university as a whole, the different Colleges will beable to apply for accreditation of their various degreeprograms, without having to worry about require-ments for general education.

Inasmuch as most general education subjects havealready been �globalized� or partially globalized, afurther structuring of these subjects should not be toocomplicated.

Ideally, there should be just one College that wouldact as �service center� for general education coursesthroughout the university, a College of Liberal Artsor General Education. This would require a separatebuilding. What SLU plans to do, however, is to assignthe �service center� of each general education subjectto the college offering the specialization in that sub-ject. For instance, Physical Education will be underthe College of Education, English under Human Sci-ences, etc. The department heads of the various G.E.

12

subjects shall have as their mother college the collegeoffering the degree program in each particular disci-pline. The faculty members, in turn, shall have theirrespective mother colleges determined by the numberof units they are handling. For instance, Faculty A isassigned 18 units in CEA and 6 in CAC, his/her mothercollege shall be CEA where he/she teaches the high-est number of units.

The overall coordination for the general educa-tion subjects will be done, as suggested by PAASCU,by the College of Human Sciences. The DepartmentHeads of the various G.E. subjects shall be in chargeof assigning the teaching load of the faculty, adoptingthe practice of the Institute of Philosophy and Reli-gion. This will be done in coordination with the re-spective Deans who will inform the Department Headsabout the number of units to be offered in their col-leges in various general subjects.

The mother college of the students shall remainthe college offering the degree courses they are pursu-ing. Thus there is no need for a separate G.E. building.

A final note regarding the general education sub-jects: over the years, some college curricula have beenoverloaded with G.E. subjects. PAASCU has sug-gested that while reorganizing the G.E. setup, SLUalso try to cut unnecessary overloads.

Other Academic Developments

This afternoon you have all witnessed the signingof a partnership with BCF in putting up a new MSprogram in Civil Engineering. SLU is also workingon new degree programs in Urban Planning and inEnvironmental Engineering. We are also thinking of aPhD program in psychology for the near future.

The College of Accountancy and Commerce hasbeen revising and streamlining its curricula. As a resultand following recent developments on the nationallevel, the Accountancy course is now spread over 5years.

ADMINISTRATIVE MATTERS

Among administrative matters worth mentioningare the activities of the Guidance Center. For SY 2000-2001, the Guidance center has maintained its existing

programs under its Information, Placement,Counseling and Testing Services. It will continue toventure into other better ways of reaching out to thestudents like the Gabay Series, a lecture/workshopseries aimed at guiding and accompanying students intheir growth and development as persons. This sum-mer, the Guidance Center will launch a new programvia the training of Peer Counselors. This will continuein the first semester and by the second semester ofSY 2001-2002 we expect to have a small team of ourown SLU students who will assist their fellow stu-dents cope with their daily struggles.

One noticeable realization of the past SY is thepermanent student ID. The permanent student IDwas an initiative of the student leaders, the KASAMA,in collaboration with the administration. The same per-petual ID was given to the SLU employees for free.It will guarantee a permanent young look for thosewho serve long years. In this connection, we shouldalso mention that our retirees were given a golden IDcard, giving them, in their golden years, a continuingaccess to the university as well as free library services.

For the first time in the SLU history, the SLUDance Troupe and Glee Club performed abroad,sponsored by the administration with the help of SLUgraduates and Baguio Californians. Three successfulperformances were held in San Francisco, Los Ange-les and San Diego. Our artists reaped well-deservedpraises in California. Studies are underway to use thenewly acquired passports more often.

Our athletes do as well as our artists. Since thestart of the BEAL (Baguio Educational AthleticLeague) in 1996, the SLU athletes have been overallchampions year after year. SY 2000-2001 was no ex-ception. Sports coordinator Lucy Calagui, the onlyrose among the thorns of the athletic directors, is right-fully proud. Our non-participation in the AbraCARAA games was based on our firm principle: Aralmuna, tapos laro. The SLU administration will continueto support our athletes while seeing to it that theirstudies always come first.

The SLU bandas � College, High School and noweven the Elementary � together with our dancegroups, continue to shine during the yearly Panagbenga,the Baguio Flower Festival. In the landscaping com-petition, the CEA has proven to know more than just

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working with steel and cement. And our architecturestudents became the talk of the town.

Financial Matters

I am particularly happy to announce that notwith-standing the lingering economic crisis, SLU remainsfinancially sound. By soundness I mean, the incomefrom tuition and other fees allows us to continue topay decent salaries and to take care of the basic main-tenance of our physical plant. Almost all the differentSLU entities break even and some come up with apositive margin that allows for prudent expansion andimprovement of the facilities.

To a large extent this picture of soundness is basedon volume of students, good and strict planning ofthe load distribution of faculty and tight supervisionof the whole operation. I know that in some cornersthis tight supervision is at times criticized and consid-ered a damper on initiatives on lower levels. I canassure though that those who take positive initiativesto enhance or expand the activities of the universitywill always find a supportive and sympathetic ear with

the higher administration. My experience tells me thatmany difficulties and frictions between administration,employees and faculty have to do with insufficientknowledge of the standard operating procedures orthe neglect thereof. It is in the interest of everybodyto move in disciplined ways in order to assure posi-tive results.

Since 1996, when I assumed the presidency, theadministration has been able to raise the salaries andbenefits every year. We hope to do so again this year,notwithstanding the fact that we have raised tuitionand other fees for the incoming SY only minimally.We take pride in offering quality education at low costto the youth of Northern Luzon. We can do it andwe do it �de facto� but we can only maintain thiseffort if all of us participate in this ongoing effort �the students, employees and faculty, and administra-tion. I am sure the leadership of the KASAMA andthe UFESLU understand this. Attorney Padang in hisletter addressed to me in connection with theupcoming renewal of the CBA states: �Our unionlooks forward to fruitful and substantial negotiationssoonest with the Saint Louis University.� I can assure

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him that the SLU administration will approach thenegotiation with a positive attitude, keeping in mindthe good of the whole Louisian family. The Cov-enant of the Heart is also part of this!

Development Plans

It is impossible to enumerate all what is happen-ing in the course of a SY in such a big outfit as SLU.Let me draw your attention though to a few activitieson the level of the development and improvementof the physical plant. Some of these activities mayhave aroused your curiosity or will soon do so.

Those among you who love to look up to theskies will have noticed people strolling around on sev-eral of the roofs of our buildings. The administrationis in the process of repairing and �rubberizing� theroofs of all the older buildings on campus. At the sideof the Men�s dorm you may have noticed trusses un-der construction. These will serve to repair the roofof the Burgos gym that was damaged during the killerearthquake 10 years ago. Soon we will also start theconstruction of two additional emergency exits forthe same gym and a bridge connecting the Diego Silangwith the Adenauer and Waldo Perfecto Buildings.

The refurbishing of the St. Theresa�s compoundalong Navy Road is nearing its completion and in afew weeks our maintenance crew will start movingblackboards, desks and chairs to the place. Our Labo-ratory High School will start operations over therethis incoming new school year. The old High Schoolfacilities will be spruced up and serve the College ofEducation and the College of Law. The expandingCollege of Nursing may also occupy some classroomsthere.

Soon some state of the art Audio-Visual equip-ment will be in place to upgrade our Audio-Visualrooms in the Rizal and Perfecto Buildings.

The lower part of the Burgos gym, as of nowstill occupied by the College of Education, will be-come the new administrative center of SLU. The of-fices of the president and the VPs for Administrationand Academic Affairs will be moved there, togetherwith the SLUnet office, the MIS office, the Personneloffice, the Legal office and the PICRO office. Also afew meeting rooms will be added. The library build-

ing will henceforth exclusively serve different sectorsof the library.

There are also plans to put up a special buildingfor PE classes parallel to the covered courts, includingpossibly an SLU Fitness center.

Reaching out

All our Colleges have their extension programs.In most cases these are part of the curriculum, forexample, the Mobile Nursing Clinic of the Collegeof Nursing and the Community Involvement Pro-gram of the College of Natural Sciences.

SLU has, however, a few outstanding programswhich we can be justly proud of. I am referring toour MOMFI Foundation and our EISSIFF Founda-tion.

The MOMFI, the Medical Outreach MissionFoundation, continues to travel the mountains and thevalleys of the Cordilleras. For the past years, Dr. RobertTolentino has been the driving force behind most ofthe MOMFI missions to remote places; he deserves aspecial commendation. Dr. Tolentino and his youth-ful collaborators indeed make us proud. Serving fromthe heart is not a campaign slogan in their case. Inrecent years, the Yuchengco foundation has joinedforces with our doctors and the hospital managementto carry out some major surgery missions right here inour hospital of the Sacred Heart. We hope that suchcollaboration may prosper.

EISSIF, the Extension Institute for Small-scale In-dustries Foundation, is another success story amongthe extension arms of SLU. Under the able leader-ship of Executive Director and Vice-President, Dr.Erlinda Manopol, EISSIF is handling again a wholeseries of programs. The Institute collaborates with anumber of foreign NGOs interested in small-scaleenterprises (Belgian, German, American). It engagesin a good number of training seminars for small en-trepreneurs. It continues to follow up and assist manysmall entrepreneurs who received their initial trainingfrom EISSIF. The latest and very successful programis the Benguet Beekeeping project. Already more than100 farmers, even our own Dean Gil Espiritu, par-ticipate in the program.

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It is impossible to exhaustively enumerate all thevarious activities going on at SLU in the course of aSY: academic activities, cultural happenings, sportsevents, extension programs, linkages with the industryand the business world, outreach programs to thecommunity, religious celebrations. At times there is somuch that one does not know where to look first.Colleges compete with each other. It is a colorful worldat times, and I wish to express my appreciation to themany faculty, employees and students who take initia-tives. The heartbeat of SLU is a healthy one, and weowe this to many committed people.

Before ending my short and incomplete summaryof events and happenings and future dreams in SLU,I would like to inform the community of a speciallinkage that keeps growing year after year. I am refer-ring to the growing collaboration among CICMSchools. As many of you probably know, SLU hasseveral sister schools, all run by CICM. There is SaintLouis College in San Fernando, La Union, Saint LouisCollege in Tuguegarao, Cagayan and Saint Mary�s Uni-versity in Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya. CICM is alsorunning Saint Louis School, in Mandawe City, Cebu.

A few years ago, upon SLU initiative and with theblessing of the CICM Provincial Council, we startedcollaborating more intensely, especially the four schoolsin the North. On the level of the BOTs, there is nowa CICM representative of each school in the respec-tive Boards. For faculty and curriculum development,we are helping each other. SLU is giving scholarshipsto faculty of the other CICM schools for graduatestudies, and SLU entered into a collaborative effortwith SMU for the development of the SMU engi-neering program. On the financial level, a commonfund has been set up for endowment purposes. Weintend also to support each other in the promotionof the vision/mission of our schools among the ad-ministrators.

Dear Friends, looking back at the past year, thereare many reasons to be grateful and count our bless-ings. May SLU continue to prosper and live up to itsvision/mission. To all of you who participate in theCovenant of the Heart at SLU, I say: Marami pongsalamat at mabuhay kayong lahat! To our visitors andguests: Thanks for being with us and God speed! !

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SLU Public Information and Community Relations Office (PICRO)Msgr. Charles Vath Library Bldg., Tel. No. 442-3043 / 2793 / 2193 or 443-2001, 444-8246 / 47

Local 297 Fax No. 442-2842Baguio City, Philippines