Category: School

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“Not in Our School” anti-bullying campaign launches

Is your kid reluctant to go to school every day? Does he/she feign illness at times?

Do you find missing school stuff, broken pencils or damaged school items?

Does your child come home always hungry or always asking you for more pocket money?

Watch out because your child might be the victim of bullying in school.

I was always told, in my younger days: “Sticks and stones can hurt my bones but words will never hurt me”. Never has a cliche been so wrong because spiteful words CAN hurt. Glaring looks can hurt. Destruction of one’s property can hurt. A person’s self-esteem can be impaired for life.

Bullying has long existed but I think it has gotten worse, judging from the growing number of bullying-related suicides whose victims are growing younger and younger. What makes matters worse, I think, is the almost dismissive, non-serious attention given to reported bullying incidents. Guidance counselors in schools don’t seem trained to handle these kinds of situations.

“Boys will be boys” (Bullying is NOT normal boys’ play)

“Just tell your child to avoid the bully” (You can’t avoid a bully who chooses to come up to you even if you try to stay away)

“Don’t worry. I will speak with him/her (the bully)” (Most times this strategy doesn’t really resolve the issue and the bullying sometimes gets even worse.)

Bullying is a reflection, I think, of the ills of society. The bully himself is a victim. Oftentimes, he is bullied at home and his only outlet is to turn into one himself with hapless victims in school. But of course, the real victims are the bullied children. Oftentimes, they choose to keep this to themselves, ashamed to let others know they are being subjected to abuse and harassment daily in school. Parents are oftentimes the last to know. And in some cases, the only time they find out is when their child takes the ultimate escape from the torture – suicide.

Well, I am finally happy that bullying in schools is getting its well-deserved attention with an anti-bullying campaign that is about to go nationwide and I hope it is eventually going to be nipped for good.

“Bully” the Movie

The Jesuit Basic Education Commission (JBEC) in cooperation with Solar Entertainment, is bringing in an acclaimed documentary film “Bully” to the Philippines. The film features actual experiences of bully victims in high schools in Georgia, Iowa, Texas, Mississippi and Oklahoma. Two of the boys featured, Tyler Long and Ty Smalley), committed suicide after enduring taunts and physical assault.

Alex, one of the 5 bullied kids in the movie
What looks like an innocent bus ride became a torturous experience for Alex

A by-invitation premiere of “Bully” will happen at Robinsons Galleria Cinema 4 on November 13, 2012 at 6:30pm. That will be followed by a theatrical run, also in November, through several Saturday block screenings in Robinsons Galleria for schools that want to show the film for their communities. Campus screenings can also be arranged for a minimal fee. Teachers and parents will be provided with discussion guides to properly process the movie’s message.

Directed by Sundance and Emmy award-winning filmmaker Lee Hirsch, Bully documents the real stories of 5 bullied kids and their families. Filmed over the course of schoolyears 2009/2010, Bully shows us the painful experiences of bullied American kids, revealing problems that cross geographical, racial, ethnic and economic borders. The movie also shows how the affected parents began a growing movement to change how incidents of bullying are handled in their schools, communities and society as a whole.

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Take online free classes with Ivy League universities!

I never imagined it would come to this but it brings me such delight to find out that the university where I earned my MBA degree, University of Pennsylvania, is one of several leading Ivy League schools in the U.S. that signed up with Coursera, a new venture that offers online classes for free. Yes…FREE!

 

So far, here is the list of top universities signed up with Coursera. Imagine, you can take a course from, let’s say, Stanford University, then take another course with John Hopkins or University of Michigan.

And here are the general course topics. Under each of these general categories are specific classes you can choose to take.

In their About Us page, the Coursera team describes themselves this way:

We are a social entrepreneurship company that partners with the top universities in the world to offer courses online for anyone to take, for free. We envision a future where the top universities are educating not only thousands of students, but millions. Our technology enables the best professors to teach tens or hundreds of thousands of students.

Through this, we hope to give everyone access to the world-class education that has so far been available only to a select few. We want to empower people with education that will improve their lives, the lives of their families, and the communities they live in.

The methodology being employed by Coursera is adapted to today’s busy lifestyle. Unlike a classroom approach where you need to be physically away from your work and devote time to class work, the Coursera approach, which by the way, is developed and taught by world-class professors, allows you to learn at your own pace, taking into consideration that you can only study in bits of time. The lessons are designed in such a way that you can read and reread till you master the course material. Interactive exercises will test your knowledge as well as reinforce concepts. And, you can monitor your own progress so you know exactly when you are considered to have mastered the subject.

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My First TEDx Experience at Xavier School

Let me just start out by saying that TED talks have really caught on with me. I enjoy watching talks on various topics, especially talks that have to do with life, technology and health. I even have the TED app on my iPad!

Recently, a blogger friend, Jay Jaboneta, was invited to speak at TEDxMontpellier on his Yellow Boat Project – providing yellow boats for children in villages isolated by bodies of water and where children had to SWIM just to get to school. It was quite an experience for me to listen via livestreaming to someone I actually knew who was in the company of other illustrious speakers as well.

A few days after TEDxMontpellier, I got wind of a TEDx talk even closer to my heart. Xavier School, my boys’ school, was going to host its own TEDx talk in just a few weeks. I quickly registered for the talk which happened last Feb. 18, 2012.

Six (6) speakers were lined up for TEDxXavierSchool (click on their names to view their TEDx talks posted on YouTube):

  • Raynard Raphael Lao — a Xavier High School student, who is also a champion public speaker at both local and regional competitions
  • Brian Maraña — International Programs Coordinator of Xavier School who has transformed the way students learn from the world
  • Tony Meloto — Founder of Gawad Kalinga, providing countless homes to the homeless and building them into communities, and speaker at the World Economic Forum
  • Dodie Ng — Games and apps creator who also founded a robotics organization and team for the youth while also being a Xavier High School student
  • Mark Ruiz — Co-Founder of Hapinoy and Founder of Rags2Riches, providing social business enterprise and microenterprise development as a living means to some of the poorest people
  • Brian Tenorio — Internationally-acclaimed, New York-based designer who has altered the way development is done through Design
With Tony Meloto of Gawad Kalinga and Mark Ruiz of Hapinoy

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MINT College: Not Your Ordinary College

 

Mint College logo

I joined a group of bloggers on a campus tour of this fairly new college called Meridian International College (or MINT). This college is located in McKinley Hill, Fort Bonifacio, Taguig City. But unlike the other schools in that area like the International School Manila, British School and the Chinese and Korean International Schools, MINT was not located in the usual kind of campus that had outdoor school grounds. It occupied the entire second floor of the Commerce and Industry Plaza Building.

A delightful surprise for me was discovering that MINT was founded by none other than my ex-boss at SGV/Andersen Consulting — Baltazar “Bal” Endriga. Bal has always been the kind of fellow who was not just nationalistic but always had the heart of a philanthropist, always wanting to give back after being given personal opportunities that brought him to where he is now. So while I was surprised that he was at the helm of this academic endeavor, it was not out of character for Bal to do so.

The aim of MINT is to provide a more creative environment for learning using the latest technologies available. Theory and practice are combined. The professors don’t just teach their subjects; it is their profession as well. Students studying film, for example, will have someone in the film industry as professor; and for those studying Music and Audio Production, they would have a music artist teaching them. MINT wants students to get their hands dirty with actual experiences, not just theory.

The entire college is an Apple school (there is an Apple Experience Center inside the school where you can actually buy Apple products) with students using iPads as notebooks.

To-date, MINT offers the following regular and short courses:

REGULAR (degree courses)

  • Applied Arts & New Media
  • Film & Communication Management
  • Music Business Management
  • Marketing
  • Entrepreneurial Management
  • Environmental Management and Sustainable Development
  • Finance and Commerce
  • Information Technology
  • Computer Science

SHORT (note: you need to check schedules with their office)

  • Film
  • iPhone/iPad App Development
  • Accounting for Non-Accountants
  • Stock Market Investing
  • Financial Management
  • Strategic Management
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Strategic Marketing for Non-Business Graduates
  • Marketing Communication
  • IT Innovation
  • Photography
  • Digital Arts
  • Illustration and Fine Arts

FACILITIES

MINT was tastefully designed to be colorful, creative and learning-inducing. From the modern foyer to the space capsule-like case/conference room aptly called Space Odyssey, to classrooms that have giant, interactive boards instead of the usual blackboard or whiteboard, to the sound studio, theater-like room, MINT is something that students would love going to school for.

Let me give you a quick visual tour:

Space Odyssey (case/conference room)

The Apple Experience Center is the activity center-library-cafeteria of MINT. I was truly delighted by the play of colors, not just here but in every room.

Apple Experience Center (library view)

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Reedley International School: Where Happy Students are Better Learners

For many years now, whenever I would pass Shaw Blvd (Kapitolyo area), I’d see this building that said Reedley International. It had always piqued my curiosity, with me wondering what kind of school it was. A couple of weeks ago, I got an invite from Carlo to visit Reedley, which by this time had transferred to the Libis area.

 

We were briefed by Jerome T. Castro, Reedley’s Headmaster, and Emil Ong, Director of School Development. Emil is the son of Nellie Aquino-Ong who founded Reedley.

Reedley started as a review center giving personalized teaching to students wanting to enter universities. The effectiveness of Nellie Ong’s tutoring prompted some parents to tell her that she should open up a school, which she eventually did. Reedley opened as an Upper School in 2000 with 80 students. A 250% growth rate in 2001, the opening of their Grade School and Middle School levels made them move to a larger building in Pasig and eventually to their present location. Now they cater to a current level of 500 students from 19 different nationalities.

 

 

My kids all went to traditional schools. In traditional schools, everyone is expected to go at the pace of the teachers who follow a lesson plan. Class sizes even in the Nursery levels are at around 30 and this could grow to almost 40 by the time they graduate high school. Some of my kids experienced bullying in school and I know that in many traditional schools, this has grown to large proportions. Teachers have their hands full teaching several sections with over 30 students each; it is really hard for a teacher to know a student closely enough to know his/her needs and personality. Luckily, the school where my boys go adopted a mentoring system to address this lack.

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Educating and Parenting the Net and Next Generation

Yesterday, I attended the annual parent orientation at Xavier School. Unlike past years, there was something different about this year, I realized. I would be attending activities in this school for only one boy (my other boy already graduated high school and is facing a new life as a college freshie).

Ever since Fr. Johnny Go, S.J. took over the helm as School Director, I have seen vast improvements in terms of facilities, quality of faculty, curriculum, use of technology in academe and so many other aspects.  In a previous post, I described how the school turned virtual during Typhoon Ondoy when school was suspended for 10 days. While many schools lost school days, Xavier students continued to study and do assigned homework via the net.

At the orientation, I eagerly awaited Fr. Johnny’s presentation to the parents. His part is always something I look forward to. After all, when the School Director blogs, uses multimedia in his presentations, has a Facebook account and maintains his own YouTube channel, you can be sure his talk would be a very interesting one. I was not disappointed.

Fr. Johnny talked about how important it is for schools (and parents) to learn how to educate and parent this generation of tech-savvy kids.

He described the TV Generation I belong to (the age when baby boomers first encountered a television set and whose free time was spent in front of the boob tube watching episodes of popular shows). He also described the next younger set called Generation X (that age group between mid 30s to mid 40s that were schooled in classrooms where passive learning was the norm: teacher lectures and student “vomits back” what he absorbed during exams).

He next described the 2 generations that students belong to now: The Net Generation (kids from 13 yrs old and up) and the Next Generation (those below 12 years old). These two generations have absolutely no fear for technology; in fact they embrace it wholeheartedly. But with such wide access to information at the tips of their fingertips, schools face a new challenge in teaching them, something that Xavier is moving briskly into. Unlike the generations of parents where  a student WAITS for content before ASSIMILATING it, learning for 21st century kids must entail what Fr. Johnny calls the 5 “-ate’s”:

* LOCATE content (e.g., how to use search engines to find information)

* INTERROGATE the results (learning not to just accept search results as truth but to interrogate which is true, half-true, or false)

* CREATE and COMMUNICATE content

* COLLABORATE with others

At the same time, kids must learn 3 things that go along with ease of technology access and information:

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