Iligan’s Google Educator Group (GEG) held a Teachers’ Fair at the CED Amphitheater on October 19, 2014 with the theme, “Fostering Flight: Teaching Our Students How to Fly” as part of the celebration of National Teachers Month and World Teachers Day.
The fair featured inspirational talks, breakout sessions, song and dance performances from local artists, trivia game, and free food and giveaways from sponsors.
Dr. Enerio E. Ebisa of the Dona Juana Actub Lluch Memorial School was the fair’s keynote speaker. A recipient of the 2014 Metrobank Outstanding Teacher award, Enerio talked about his experiences of being a teacher and the lessons he learned from life’s challenges.
There were four 10-minute lightning talks during the fair. The speakers were Roxanne Fuentes (GEG Cagayan de Oro Community Leader) talked about GEGs across Southeast Asia; Jessie Andallasa (Google Certified Teacher 2014) shared about the benefits of joining a GEG Chapter; Avril Joy Ramayan (CED ICT Team member) discussed the DigiBayanihan Project; and Mark Plaza (GEG Iligan Community Leader) talked about 10x Thinking and Moonshots.
More than 100 teachers from the elementary, high school and college level participated in the event. Although it was intentionally offered to Iligan City-based public and private school teachers, there were also participants from Lanao del Norte, Naawan, and Cagayan de Oro City.
The key organizers of the fair were teachers from the Institute’s Integrated Developmental School and the ICT Team of the Institute’s College of Education.
The fair is also in line with the Institute’s aspirations of reaching out to the teaching community and build linkages for research, training, and collaboration.
In April 2014, Google Philippines recognized Mark N. Plaza of the MSU-IIT Integrated Developmental School as the community manager of Google Educator Group (GEG)- Iligan. GEGs are community-led groups empowered by Google to collaborate with other educators in meeting the needs of the students through the use of technology solutions in the teaching profession. The GEG-Iligan core group, comprised by MSU-IIT teachers, is also recognized by the Institute by virtue of Special Order 00739-IIT S. 2014, which specifies the function of GEG Iligan: to “take lead in building relationships with other educators and gain necessary skills to use open technology to deliver the best possible education to their students.” Aside from the community manager, the GEG Iligan core group is composed of the following faculty members: Charity Mulig (IDS), Ivy Claire Mordeno (IDS), Alexis Michael Oledan (IDS), Crispin Ebal Jr. (IDS), Honeylet Dumoran (CASS) and Jun Karren Caparoso.
To date, there are 24 GEGs across the Philippines—GEG Iligan being the 12th GEG. GEG-Iligan’s Inaugural meet-up was held last July 18, 2014 at MarRo’s Cocina, Iligan City. This was participated by 90 educators from public schools and private schools in Iligan.
Plaza gave the overview on GEGs and described how Google values the power of communities. Dr. Olga Alonsabe, Officer-in-charge of the Assistant Schools Division Superintendent, gave a message on the importance of the learning community and how technology is viewed: how it is needed, how the academe must adapt and how teachers can enjoy its advantages.
Philip Tanpoco, the Google representative and head of the Google Education Outreach Program for South East Asia, gave the keynote speech for the event. In his message, Mr. Tanpoco underscored the capacity of Mindanao educators to cooperate in the advancement of the use of technology in the classroom.
Other speakers in the event included Prof. Dante Dinawanao, officer-in-charge of the MSU-IIT Computer Center, who discussed the MSU-IIT experience with Google Apps; Ms. Odyssa Natividad Molo, faculty member of IDS, who shared her experience in the use of the Google Drive in her classroom; and Prof. Charity Mulig-Cruz, GEG core group member, who discussed the future direction of GEG Iligan.
The inaugural meetup was sponsored by Smart Telecom-Iligan, Google Philippines and other local businesses. The event was co-sponsored by DepEd Iligan City, the Iligan Bloggers Society and Clique (the photography club in MSU-IIT).
