A one-time four-month summer break!
For
some students of the University of the Philippines, the unexpected long
vacation was the biggest boon resulting from the sudden change in the school
calendar, from June to March of previous years, to this schoolyear’s August to
May time frame.
For
casual observers however, the calendar shift was rather abrupt and seemingly
rushed. “Railroaded” was another description that comes to mind. After all,
talks about the move became rife only in the second half of 2013, with the move
approved early this year. And now, it’s a done deal, with UP students looking
at August 7 as their first day of school.
Where
were the feasibility studies? Shouldn’t more time been given to consultations
with faculty and students? Why was there such urgency anyway?
In the
meantime, what happens during that four-month summer break?
Aside
from offering a midyear term, or a second summer term, to cover the idle months
of June and July and make full use of the break, the faculty and staff could
also use the time to prepare, UP Diliman chancellor Mike Tan said.
“We
thought June and July would be a good time for academic preparations like
holding strategic workshops and planning curricula. In a way, those two months
are really a bonus for faculty and staff,” he added.
The
break has also afforded the university the much-needed time to renovate dorms
and spruce up the whole campus.
“We
never really had that two-month-long break to do just that,” Tan said.
For
some UP students, it was the breather they were waiting for. One incoming
fourth-year law student said he’d finally have the time to do his internship,
which wouldn’t have been possible if the old school calendar had been followed.
“Some
really grade-anxious law students won’t even commit to summer activities until
all their grades are complete,” said 25-year-old Jose Aniceto David Dealino who
with the summer break doubled, even had time to catch up on his favorite TV
shows and learn how to cook before doing his internship in the judicial
department.
Meanwhile,
other issues have been dredged up: What about the Lantern Parade in December?
Will there still be sunflowers during a May graduation?
Going
global has been cited as the primary reason for the move. But producing
globally competitive graduates have always been a goal, so why the shift t this
time?
While
acknowledging that the change should have been done earlier, UP president
Alfredo Pascual said it was the Asean economic integration in 2015 that served
as the trigger.
“We
want to have closer relationships with the leading universities among
member-countries… We want to be able to send them our best students in exchange
programs and likewise receive their best students in our university,” he said.
If all
targets are met, by 2015, Asean member-countries would see a free flow of
goods, capital, services, investment and skilled labor across the region. And
when that happens, Pascual added, college students and graduates must be able
to look beyond national borders and “think Asean.”
“A
change that will synchronize UP’s academic calendar with the major universities
in Asean and around the world will provide a clear signal that UP is now
internationalizing and is getting ready to fully engage universities in the
country’s trading partners,” UP’s rationale statement for the calendar shift
similarly stated.
UP,
along with Ateneo de Manila University and De La Salle University which also
announced their calendar shifts next year, is a member of the Asean University
Network (AUN). After Thailand made the shift, the Philippines remained the only
country in Asean implementing the June-March school year.
Pascual
said it was “a necessary condition that we need to implement to support our
thrust toward internationalizing UP.”
But, he
clarified, internationalizing the university doesn’t mean enticing more foreign
students to earn their degrees in UP. Rather, it is about enhancing the
mobility of faculty and students for them to engage with the international
academic community with fewer limitations.
They
want to make sure that school calendars are synchronized so that exchange
programs need not cost a lot, the UP official said.
Under
the old calendar, studying abroad entails a lot of cost, inconvenience and
wasted time, “especially for programs where units taken are not credited by the
home university,” said Maritoni Molina, a UP alumna who attended an exchange
program in South Korea in 2009.
Molina
graduated three semesters late when she chose to be an exchange student at
Kangwon National University in South Korea.
“I had
to end my 2nd semester in UP Diliman abruptly and cut the entire month of March
to be able to make it to the start of the school year in South Korea. Some of
my professors had me drop their subjects, which were prerequisites to other
subjects,” she said. “It meant that upon my return, I had to take the same
subjects again instead of moving forward.”
Her
exchange program ended in December, when the second semester at UP had already
started. She had to wait for three more months until the summer term to get
back to school, she said.
“[The
delay] meant getting employed only two years after my batch mates did. But I
have no regrets,” said Molina, now a law student at San Beda College Manila.
The
international conventions and competitions held during the summer term of
foreign universities in Europe, which is from June to July, had also meant that
UP performing artists had to miss a whole semester just to join dance or choral
competitions.
These
problems are among those that the shift in calendar can resolve, Pascual said.
Still,
the UP official acknowledged that the abrupt change entails a number of
adjustments.
“Of
course, nothing is free,” Pascual said. “There’s a saying, if a problem is
created by man, man should be able to solve it. We would have to make some
adjustments.”
Among
naysayers, a major adjustment is the heat of the summer months that could deter
concentration and distract students from schoolwork. It’s an argument that Tan
and Pascual don’t buy.
“Summer
classes have been held for as long as I can remember despite the heat. It’s not
as if it’s something new and different,” Pascual said.
If
anything, under both rain and sun, the UP Diliman community could certainly use
more covered walks, a project that’s already in the pipeline, Tan added.
Pascual
denied that the shift was meant to reduce the number of class suspensions
because of inclement weather.
On
average, going for the shift would save the university only two days of no
classes, which is not that significant, he said. And in both old and new
calendars, the rainy months of August and September would still be there.
There
was nothing the university couldn’t fix, the official said confidently.
Even
the dates of licensure exams can be adjusted, Pascual said, citing initial
discussions with the Philippine Regulatory Commission, which administers the
board exams, and with the Supreme Court for the bar exams.
“Should
the dates of exams remain the same, one adjustment, according to some colleges,
is to start the review while the students are still in the second semester.
It’s not a big deal,” he said.
As for
other UP traditions such as the Lantern Parade in December and the blooming
sunflowers during graduation, Pascual has apparently given them some thought.
The
first semester in the new calendar would end in December, so the usual date for
the Lantern Parade would fall on finals week.
“[The
parade] has not been settled yet. Shall we hold it a few weeks earlier so we
don’t jeopardize the exam period of our students? Or shall we hold it in an
entirely different date or month?” Pascual asked.
“The
parade used to be a celebration of Christmas but it has since evolved. The
theme is more universal now, no longer just a Christian theme,” he added. “I
was thinking, why not Valentine’s Day?”
Regarding
the sunflowers, which students feel wouldn’t bloom in time for their graduation
in May, Pascual quipped, “we have scientists here, maybe they can solve that
riddle.”
The new
calendar also has benefits not related to internationalization. It has placed
the two semesters in a more logical setup, as it rolls into one the two long
vacations of the school year: the semestral and the Christmas breaks.
Tan
said that under the old set-up, Christmas seemed to be huge distraction in the
second semester.
“Because
the sem starts in November, then by December, people are losing focus, thanks
to Christmas preparations. They’re not really paying attention, being busy with
our Lantern Parade and all,” he said. “And then they go off on a break, and
when they come back in January, there’s a real hangover.”
Many
faculty members, including himself, felt that they had to start all over again,
Tan said. “And then before you know it, it’s already the end of the semester.”
Empirical
evidence also shows that grades tend to be lower in the second semester than in
the first. So removing the Christmas break distraction in the second sem would
be pedagogically beneficial, Pascual said. Not to mention, economical, as it
would mean students would have to fly home to their hometowns only once in the
middle of the year.
Tan
also noted that the two semesters would each have long holidays, the All
Saints’ Day break for the first semester of August to December, and the Holy
Week for the second semester of January to May.
Operational
issues aside, some groups have described the internationalization of education
as anti-Filipino, a move that would push more students to leave the country.
“While
Filipino students are being packaged as globally competitive and
internationally at par with foreign students, this largely means that Filipino
students are being honed to leave the country to serve the global masters as
global slaves. [They should instead] be encouraged to stay in the country and
serve their fellow citizens,” according to a position paper on the issue
released by the National Union of Students of the Philippines.
“I
usually, say, fine, but we already know that our graduates go abroad. So if we
improve our programs in UP, we can make sure that those who go abroad will be
able to do a better job than the older graduates. They would be better
prepared,” Pascual said.
UP is
mandated to produce the future leaders of the country, and we are just being
true to that mandate, he added.
“The
future leaders of this country will no longer be confined within our
boundaries. They should be able to operate across our national borders,”
Pascual said.
“An
internationalized UP will be in a better position to produce Filipino graduates
who are internationally oriented and have the competence to assume leadership
not only in the Philippines, but also in the region which will become an
integrated Asean Economic Community by 2015,” the UP rationale statement
declared.
But the
issue is apparently a concern not only for UP but the rest of the country’s
higher education institutions (HEIs).
To be
globally competitive has always been on the agenda of the Commission on Higher
Education (CHEd), chair Patricia Licuanan said.
But,
she added, it was not desirable for other colleges to follow suit just because
the top universities, UP, ADMU, DLSU, University of Santo Tomas and Adamson
University, are shifting their calendars in the name of internationalization.
When
the country’s top universities started shifting calendars, all of a sudden,
other colleges and universities wanted to do the same, but for all the wrong
reasons, she noted.
“I keep
asking the question, ‘Why?’ which is a very basic question, and the type of
answers I would get is ‘uhm, I think we can overcome the problems, I think we
can do it.’ Sort of like they can overcome the hurdles but why they really
wanted it, wasn’t clear,” she said.
Licuanan,
who is also part of the university’s Board of Regents, has nothing against UP’s
academic calendar shift, but said it was the possible bandwagon effect that
bothered her the most.
Other
institutions might have gotten worried that they would be left behind because
the big universities are doing it so they started thinking that maybe they
should go for it, too.
But
CHEd has been firm on its stand on the matter: The shift in academic calendar
may be good for a few but it’s not for all. The country’s HEIs operate on
different levels, with some universities ready to engage with the international
community while others still have a long way to go, Licuanan said.
“I
think the goals [of internationalizing education that] they want to achieve are
goals we want to achieve for the country and for HEIs, as well. But there are
other ways to achieve them,” she said. “Changing the calendar is just one
possibility. … and it only makes exchange programs slightly more convenient.”
According
to its position paper released in March, a result of the discussion conducted by
a technical work group tasked to look into the issue, CHEd firmly believes that
the best way to internationalize education is for HEIs to intensify quality
assurance, capacity building and institutional development programs.
“HEIs
have to put a premium on knowledge generation and production as an initial step
to internationalization,” the paper said.
CHEd
also argued that the academic calendar is not really a big deal for the Asean
integration in 2015. Efforts should instead be directed toward making sure that
college graduates would be at par with their Asean counterparts.
Even UP
president Pascual agreed that the shift, as dramatic as it may seem, is but a
minor detail in the grand scheme of internationalization. A lot of work remains
to be done in ensuring that UP would succeed in prepping its graduates and the
university itself for the world.
“We
need to make sure we continue to maintain a strong faculty with advanced
degrees in their areas of expertise,” he said.
Facilities
should also be improved, he said, “so that foreign students will find it
comfortable [to] study here, especially if they are coming from a more advanced
country.”
Arrangements
with other universities for mutual recognition or transfer of credits should
also be made, so that courses taken in the country are recognized for credit in
the home universities of students, and those taken abroad will be credited
here, Pascual said.
There
would definitely be changes in the curriculum, he added.
Shifting
the academic calendar is but a springboard to more valuable improvements in UP,
Pascual said, adding that the shift was the disruption that UP needed to move
forward.
“If you
want to change for the better, you have to disrupt the current ways. Otherwise,
there will be complacency and it would very difficult to achieve progress.
“How
many people are conscious about the need to prepare the university for
internationalization? Nobody was paying attention. But when we shifted the
calendar, everybody (started talking) about it,” Pascual said, citing public
discussions on the work that needs to be done to make Philippine education
globally competitive.
As a
member university of the AUN and in line with the Asean vision of harmonization
and standardization, some of UP’s degree programs are subjected to quality
assurance assessment and reviewed by a panel of international professors, he
said.
“Back
when I was coming in as president of the university, there was strong
opposition to degree programs being reviewed by outsiders.”
But now
with the idea of Asean integration drummed up, at least three undergraduate
programs of UP have already been submitted for review, including statistics and
engineering in UP Diliman and biology in UP Los BaƱos, Pascual said. A few more
programs are now lined up for assessment.
“So
this is what I mean about what disruption can bring about. But we have to be
careful, of course, so we don’t fall over the cliff,” he said.
Change,
Pascual added, is sometimes needed “to stimulate progress. It keeps people on
their toes.”
But, he
warned, “it also makes them feel uncomfortable.”
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