Submitted by Vox Bikol on
While driving along Mercedes Ave. in Pasig, I saw a huge tarpaulin streamer of a school proudly congratulating one of its students who passed the UPCAT or the University of the Philippines College Admission Test—the toughest college entrance exam in the country. This reminded me of the Central Visayan Institute Foundation (CVIF) in far-flung Jagna, Bohol, which has had an increasing number of students easily passing the UPCAT. And this year, 11 actually made it or up to about 10% of CVIF seniors. Indeed, more than that, 17 CVIF students scored in the 99-99+ percentile rank in the 2010 NCAE given by the DepEd.
Around the country and even abroad, there has been an increasing interest in CVIF, particularly on how it has become possible for students of a high school with meager resources and facilities in a remote rural town to have been achieving superior performance and gaining college admission into the top universities in the country. One alumna has even made it to the University of California at Berkeley.
Truth to tell, it’s because of a system-based approach of learning in CVIF dubbed as Dynamic Learning Program (DLP) that was developed by a husband and wife team of physicist-educators—Dr. Christopher C. Bernido and Dr. Maria Victoria Z. Carpio-Bernido.
Well, Chris and Marivic happen to be my brother-in-law and sister, and consider this my own little way of added support to their efforts in improving education—being a former high school teacher myself. But beyond this connection, here’s what the Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation said about the couple in naming them as among the 2010 recipients of Asia’s premier prize: “In electing Christopher Bernido and Ma. Victoria Carpio-Bernido to receive the 2010 Ramon Magsaysay Award, the board of trustees recognizes their purposeful commitment to both science and nation, ensuring innovative, low-cost, and effective basic education even under Philippine conditions of great scarcity and daunting poverty.”
Now, part of their continuing efforts will be the “2nd Workshop on the CVIF-Dynamic Learning Program,” which will be held on April 12 and 13, 2011, at the Philippine Social Science Center in Quezon City. The theme is “Bridging 21st Century Scientific Research and the Classroom.” They will also introduce “CVIF-DLP PLUS” for the standardization and upscaling of DLP in participating schools. This will cover establishing a management system, accreditation process, continuing evaluation and upgrade of CVIF-DLP. (For more information, pls. contact: Tess Carpio-Bacungan, Program Director / email: cvif_dlp@yahoo.com)
“We do not look at the material aspects. Rather, we focus on the mind, the spirit and the heart of each child, and there we see ‘untapped capabilities and incredible resiliency’,” Chris and Marivic share whenever asked about CVIF-DLP.
True enough, our children are our national treasures. And if each child can achieve learning excellence, then it will not be long before we see our Nation among the advanced countries in the world.