The Service Learning Program (SLP) aims to provide Xavier Ateneo students from various academic disciplines with constructive and transformative learning experiences. It is an engagement with partner communities and institutions that brings theoretical premise into proactive social relevance.
To this end, the Xavier University - Ateneo de Cagayan Senior High School, during its convocation this year, sought to adopt the SLP and institutionalize it in their curriculum.
Learning from the experiences of the grade school, junior high, and tertiary units of the university that have SLP already, XUSHS hopes to create their own version of the program and customize it to the knowledge and skills of the senior high school.
University president Fr Roberto C Yap SJ told the crowd at the XUSHS convocation held on August 15 at the XU Little Theater that Xavier Ateneo is a “project of social transformation” in line with the theme of the assembly of the International Association of Jesuit Universities (IAJU) at the University of Deusto in Bilbao, Spain last month.
JESUIT UNIVERSITY. Xavier Ateneo president Fr Roberto C Yap SJ urges everyone to participate in the six priority areas of the International Association of Jesuit Universities. Supplied photo.
“Our Fr General [Arturo Sosa SJ] highlighted in the IAJU assembly, the biggest network of Jesuit academic institutions, that a Jesuit university is ‘a project of social transformation, seeking wisdom, and aiming at universal citizenship’,” Yap shared.
“Xavier Ateneo must participate in pursuing the priorities of IAJU: (1) bringing education to the marginalized and disadvantaged, (2) formation of civic and political leaders, (3) promoting an integrated economic and environmental justice approach, (4) formation of lay and Jesuit leadership, (5) promoting interfaith dialogue, and (6) promoting peace and reconciliation,” he added.
For Yap, SLP is one of the concrete ways of realizing the six priority areas, bringing the academe and communities together towards sustainable development.
XU SENIOR HIGH. Faculty and staff of XU Senior High School join the convocation at the XU Little Theater. Supplied photo.
Last year alone, tertiary-level SLP was able to mobilize nearly 2,200 students, over 50 faculty members, and 45 partners in its 46 projects in various areas.
Engr Gail P Dela Rita, SLP coordinator from the Social Development cluster, expressed her gratitude to the SLP participants who were instrumental in the success of the relief operations of Tabang Marawi.
“We couldn’t have done it without you, the students, faculty, staff, partner communities, and organizations who worked together to help the IDPs (internally-displaced persons/families) in Marawi,” she said.
Dr Libby Abesamis, SHS assistant principal for administration, presented about the Andrew L Gotianun Sr Center for Integrated Technologies (ALGCIT), an endowment from the Gotianun Foundation that provides full academic and residential SHS scholarships to “competent yet financially-disadvantaged youth.”
ALGCIT aims to champion technical and vocational education, provide profitable employment options or entrepreneurial opportunities for its graduates, and contribute to the country's social and economic growth.
Abesamis hopes that SLP can complement the mission of ALGCIT, to respond to the need for a comprehensive program to help tech-voc students acquire skills, knowledge, and character formation that is grounded on Jesuit education, necessary to develop their professional careers.
SERVICE LEARNING. XU Senior High School principal Dr Rogelio Gawahan assures that steps have been taken to make Service Learning Program part of the SHS curriculum. Supplied photo.
XU Junior High School assistant principal for academics Lea Lilibeth Emata also shared the best practices of their Social Formation Programs and engagements with Tulong Dunong schools.
“Through the Tulong Dunong program, we were able to immerse our students at a young age in different social realities, especially in our partner public elementary schools,” Emata said.
“Our junior high school students were able to share their knowledge with the elementary pupils through tutorial sessions and in turn, our JHS students learned the value of service to others, of what it means to ‘men and women for others’,” she added.
XU Senior High School principal Dr Rogelio Gawahan, in his message, has recognized the importance of service learning in the formation of students and he assured that steps have been taken to make SLP part of the curriculum in the next academic year.∎