by Christine F. Godinez Ortega, Office of Publication & Information (OPI)
MSU-IIT opens gates to MSU-Marawi student evacuees; no vehicles allowed inside campus
The MSU-IIT agreed to temporarily house MSU student evacuees only, said Chancellor Sukarno D. Tanggol during today’s Campus Academic Planning Committee (APC) meeting at the Boardroom.
Parents accompanying the student evacuees must proceed to the School of Fisheries in Buruun Iligan City and coordinate with the City Social Welfare and Development Office.
The decision was concurred in by the Deans and Directors and the Student Government KASAMA President Jhon Alter Ortiz.
“It is our obligation to help students, and we must prevent unnecessary panic,” said Chancellor Tanggol referring to the volatile situation in Marawi City since an organized group invaded the city at about 2:00 in the afternoon on Tuesday, May 23.
Firefights erupted between government forces and armed men identified by the military as members of the extremist group Maute, alleged sympathizers of the ISIS terrorist organization.
The MSU main campus student evacuees will be directed to the Student Lounge located on the first floor of the College of Arts & Social Sciences (CASS) building according to CASS Dean Dr. Marie Joy D. Banawa who was also at the APC meeting.
At the same time, CASS Assistant Dean Sittie Noffaisah Pasandalan also told OPI that food is being prepared for the evacuees who have not reportedly eaten since intense fighting broke out last night, May 23. As of this writing, some students fleeing the main campus rode in commercial jeeps from Marawi City but other students have been forced to walk using side streets.
Evacuees fleeing Marawi City have been stalled at choke points due to hundreds of vehicles flooding the city’s narrow streets and main thoroughfares.
The CASS will also act as a clearing house, where evacuees will have to present their ID cards and fill out necessary documents to prove they are bonafide students of the main campus.
The Chancellor, the Security Officers, student leaders, the Emergency Response Team, and other officials also met today to discuss further strategies regarding how to secure the Institute and how to help the student evacuees. (See related notice and guidelines issued by the OC-OPI).
It was also agreed that certain buildings around the campus be declared off limits to outsiders like the College of Engineering and Technology (COET), College of Science & Mathematics (CSM), School of Computer Studies (SCS), and the PRISM building.
According to unverified reports, sporadic gunfire could still be heard and 20 truckloads of soldiers arrived in Marawi City as reinforcements to government troops. It has also been reported that ten Rural Transit Buses through the Land Transportation Franchising & Regulatory Board have been fielded to pick up stranded commuters and evacuees in Marawi City.
Iligan City is on red alert but offices and business establishments remain open. A peaceful atmosphere has prevailed in the city.
(L-R) DOST-SEI Director Dr. Josette T. Biyo, John Logos G. Guiang,
Anjie Lyn R. Engaño and BPIIF Executive Director Ms. Faye Corcuera
In recognition of their academic standing and research work that revolved around the theme “Building Resilient Cities for Sustainable Development”, two IITians received the BPI-DOST Science Awards on April 4, 2017 at Mind Museum, Taguig City.
BS Biology senior student Anjie Lyn R. Engaño and BS Metallurgical Engineering fourth year student John Logos N. Guiang were recognized together with other 28 young researchers around the country for their scholastic achievement and research work.
Engaño’s “Optimization of Freshwater Microalgae for Phycoremediation in Iligan City” and “Guiang’s Gold Extraction from Historic Mine Operations Tailings by Cyanide Leaching below 53µm” are among the country’s most outstanding research works of the year. The two will present each of their paper on May 23, 2017 at MSU-IIT, Mini-theater for the BPI-DOST Science Award 2017 University Recognition.
The Department of Science and Technology, in partnership with the BPI Foundation, sets up the Science Awards to inspire, recognize, and support the most outstanding young scientists and innovators in the Philippines as it enables a new generation of leaders to generate targeted scientific research and technology which would help future-proof cities around the Philippines to become more resilient to the physical, social, and economic challenges that are a growing part of the 21st century.
The Office of Publication & Information (OPI) conducts its 3rd Series of Training-Workshop for its Campus Ambassadors and the 4th Series of Training-Workshop for the writers and editors of Schools, Colleges, Offices and for student writers of the Institute. The training in journalism focuses on broadcasting news and features for public affairs.
Two resource speakers, Stacy Danika S. Alcantara of the Office of Public Diplomacy, Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and Stanley Buenafe Cajete of ABS-CBN will conduct the training-workshop for the two day affair.
Alcantara, graduated with a degree in Mass Communication from Silliman University, summa cum laude, the first to receive the honor from the university in over 30 years. She is a former Miss Silliman titlist, editor of the Official Student Publication The Sillimanian and was President of the Silliman University Student Government.
She was awarded one of ten Jose Rizal Model Students of the Philippines in 2008 and in 2009 she delivered the Batch Response in Malacanang Palace when she was awarded one of Ten Outstanding Students of the Philippines. She is a novelist of young adult fiction, a seasoned journalist and has worked for two multi-national corporations until she topped the Foreign Service Exam with an overall rating of 91.21 percent in 2013-2014.
Her first assignment at the DFA was as Principal Assistant to the Office of the Director General of the APEC National Organizing Council serving under Ambassador Marciano Paynor. She is currently the Principal Assistant of the Public and Media Affairs Division of the Office of Public Diplomacy where she leads the Department’s Digital Diplomacy efforts. She works closely with the Office of ASEAN Affairs in engaging the public about the Philippines’ chairmanship of ASEAN in 2017.
ABS-CBN’s Stanley Buenafe Gajete is segment Producer and Writer of the TV network’s popular programs, TV Patrol, Salamat Dok and The Bottomline with Boy Abunda; is Segment Researcher of Matanglawin, the ABS-CBN News and Current Affairs, a news writer for the Philippine Daily Inquirer, a News Catalog writer and a Video researcher for ABS-CBN News and Current Affairs.
Gajete finished a BS in Development Communication, cum laude from the UP Los Banos, and an MA in Journalism from UP Diliman. He had topped his class for Best Produced feature story video for his Certificate in Broadcast Journalism from the ABS-CBN University. He also received a Certificate in Broadcast Voice from the same University.
Among his awards is the 2013 Gawad Felicisimo T. San Luis as Outstanding Youth of Laguna. He has represented the country in the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre as paper and oral presenter (Social Category) in Bangkok, Singapore and in Dubai.
It’s not a secret that there is a lot of interest being generated by the so called Millennials or those who were born between 1980 and 2000.
Millennials or the members of the “Generation Y” or, as Time Magazine puts it, the “Me Me Me Generation,” have been criticized for being “lazy and narcissistic”, and possessed of “a sense of entitlement”.
Accurate or not, the description is hotly debated around the world.
In MSU-IIT, however, the Guidance Counseling Center (GCC) is of the mind that Millennials need understanding, and by virtue thereof, is helping organize a seminar that would provide their student peer facilitators and learning assistance volunteers knowledge on how to understand and reach out to the members of this new generation “in an ethical way”.
Almost all of the current student population of MSU-IIT were born between 1990 and 2000, making them Millennials.
The seminar, which is scheduled on December 14 at the College of Nursing Hall, features guidance counselor Charity M. Pagarigan, RPm as the resource person.
The GCC is assisting the Organization of Student Peer Facilitators (OSPF) and the Learning Assistance Volunteers (LAV) in putting together the half day (8 a.m. to 12 noon) event that will also double as the two organizations’ year-end fellowship and enrichment activity.
The year-end fellowship and enrichment activity actually functions as the culmination of an annual training to be given by the GCC to the members of the OSPF and LAV on December 12 and 13.
Acting head of the GCC Evelyn I. Dominguez, RP, RGC, told Chancellor Sukarno D. Tanggol in a letter that the seminar hopes to equip their student peer facilitators and learning assistance volunteers with the appropriate “attending and helping skills”.
Dr. Dominguez said in the letter that the seminar is called, “Understanding the Millennials: Ethical Considerations in Reaching Out to Them”.
An MSU-IIT student who was one of the victims in Saturday night’s kidnapping met with the Office of Publication & Information (OPI) yesterday to recount his ordeal.
Juhari Gubat, 18, a General Education student said he was released together with three others on Monday by the still unidentified armed men who abducted him and five other companions on June 6, 2016.
Of the six kidnapped, only two remain with the kidnappers. Both are students of MSU-IIT identified as Cid Rick Jamias (5th Year BS Electronics and Communication) and Berzon Paeste (4th year AB History).
Gubat said that their kidnappers just released them Monday morning, and even gave them P200.00 as fare money. They were never rescued by the authorities as reported by other posts in Social Media nor were they taken forcibly into a vehicle.
Gubat was released along with non-IIT students Kevin Limpin, Hannah Yurong, and Eloisa Lacson. The kidnappers, however, held on to Jamias and Paeste.
Gubat, Limpin, Yurong, and Lacson were with Jamias and Paeste in a white Toyota Revo driven by a certain “Moamar”. The vehicle had the plate number KGJ 661 which is now believed to be fake or stolen as authorities allegedly traced this to belong to a Multicab vehicle in Cagayan de Oro City.
Gubat also clarified that he only met “Moamar” on Saturday at around 4 o’clock in the afternoon. Gubat said that “Moamar” approached him and introduced himself as a cousin, and asked for his number. He described “Moamar” with curly hair, to be around 5’3” and in his ‘30s.
Later in the evening, “Moamar” called him on his cell phone while he was still in the dormitory with Paeste and Jamias asking to hang out. At the same time, Paeste also got a call from Eloisa Lacson asking if they wanted to hang out at the Caltex Gas Station in Tibanga. Gubat, Paeste and Jamias then decided to let Moamar pick them up at the dormitory.
While they were at the Caltex Gas Station, Jamias decided to leave for the Bus Terminal so he could go to Maranding town (Lanao del Norte) but Moamar offered to drive him. The rest went along in the vehicle.
While the students were on their way to Maranding, six armed men flagged down their vehicle along a dark stretch of road in Barangay Buru-un near the popular Timoga Spring Pools.
“The men had ball caps on and were wearing their backpacks in front. They pointed .45 cal. pistols at us, and ordered us to open the doors,” Gubat recounted. The men boarded the vehicle and later blindfolded them, he said. When the blindfolds came off, Gubat said that he and his companions saw the name of Panga Elementary School. Panga is located in Munai, Lanao del Norte.
“They were very scary-looking, and they kept insisting that my companions and I were into drugs,” he said. Some of the armed men looked 18 to 19 years old to him.
After about two hours of being blindfolded, the group were made to get off the vehicle and to walk along a muddy, uphill place when they were separated. Gubat and the other three were brought to a house that was allegedly owned by the driver, alias Moamar. Each one was interviewed by the kidnappers who asked about their parents’ occupations. Gubat said Jamias and Paeste were brought to another place.
Yesterday afternoon, the OPI held a press conference at the MSU-IIT Boardroom and invited members of the local press and correspondents of national dailies through the local Philippine Information Agency (PIA).
MSU-IIT Security Chief Eduardito “Ditto” Maruhom briefed the media about recent developments and the combined efforts of the AFP 2nd Mechanized Brigade forces, the PNP and the NBI in rescuing the MSU-IIT students Jamias and Paeste still held captive by kidnappers.
Chancellor Dr. Sukarno D. Tanggol once more expressed his concern over the safety of the two students and said “we should do more and with concerted effort put an end to criminality. Our problems are gargantuan,” he said.
He likewise told the media that the Institute’s security measures on campus have further been tightened.
The Institute’s Chief Security Officer, Eduardito “Ditto” Maruhom is closely monitoring the situation and said he is hopeful that the remaining captives, Jamias and Paeste will be released soon by the kidnappers.
Chancellor Tanggol reiterated that campus security is stringent and despite the fact that the kidnapping happened off campus, he still wants them, as MSU-IIT students to be returned unharmed. — Office of Publication & Information
____________________________________ Office of Publication & Information (OPI) MSU-Iligan Institute of Technology Tel. (063) 2228769
