Author Bios

Willy B. Prilles, Jr.

Willy B. Prilles, Jr.

Articles by this author:

  • It’s also about accountability

    THE ISSUE OF accountability, I think, is one of key important ingredients missing in the renewed debate on the state of education in the country.
    A recent three-part series of the Philippine Daily Inquirer laid down all the numbers, capped by Thursday’s editorial that takes to task the DepEd bureaucracy for not getting the basics right. In the same breath, it called for a return to the basics, addressing the usual shortages in classrooms and teachers among them.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • Para sa mga kaakian

    KAN nakaaging Miercoles, nagtiripon sa kaenot-enoteng pagkakataon an mga alkalde kan pitong ciudades igdi sa Kabikolan para sa sarong sharing workshop. An tiripon na idto ipinaapod ni Legazpi City Mayor Noel Rosal, pamayo kan League of Cities of the Philippines igdi sa Bikol, asin ginibo sa Villa Caceres Hotel.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • An outsider looking in

    WHEN Kristian Cordero approached me to do a review of Andrew Recepcion’s “God’s Global Household -- A Theology of Mission in the Context of Globalization,” I hesitated initially, considering that I belong to a different faith: I am a Jehovah’s Witness. Kristian, however, said the author wouldn’t mind having a non-Catholic do it; after all, we are neighbors at the Vox Bikol opinion page. Having said that, let me proceed with my thoughts on this book.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • A Frankenstein project

    I READ through the transcript of Thursday's Senate committee hearing on the controversial National Broadband Network (NBN).  And in the end, I get the feeling that just like the Cyber Education Project, the NBN started out as a good idea that later metamorphosed into a sort of a Frankenstein project, no thanks to the usual suspects in the Arroyo regime.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • A Way Forward for the Cyber Ed Project

    HOW can we make the Cyber Education Project (CEP) more attuned to Philippine realities on the ground? In my weblog, I already discussed opposing views on the CEP, its upsides and downsides, and the institutional requirements to make it work. Let me outline how we can move it forward.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • Daily lesson planning, anyone?

    OCTOBER is the month when public school students go into a week-long break ending the first semester of the school year. The break also allows their teachers to attend training arranged by their respective division or district offices.
    I was reminded of this after my wife, who teaches geometry at Camarines Sur National High School, was extra-busy last week – as Math club president, she had to oversee their departmental in-service training and aside from that prepare something to share to fellow math teachers.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • Ang paradigm shift at ang mga erehe ng KWF

    LABIS ang kasiyahan ko matapos basahin ang keynote address ni Ricardo Ma. Nolasco, chairman ng Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino (KWF) sa 2007 Nakem conference na isinagawa sa Mariano Marcos State University noong Mayo 23, 2007. It made my day, ika nga.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • Salvation in September

    September in Naga is when all the people in Bikol are saved. En masse.
    Or, that’s how I thought it was growing up in this small city in the 60s and 70s. The month of August is the anomalous month– it is neither here nor there, not summer and not wet season either. Old people say that when you get a wound in the month of August, it will be slow to heal. Unbidden, the month is a perfect month, well defined, albeit impetuous for a month that introduces the change in the direction of the wind. It is a season of feast. Unheralded, it hides no taboo. Only salvation.

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.
  • Will history repeat itself?

    AT THE height of the abaca trade in the late 1800s until around the turn of the 20th century – which is about 100 years ago – Albay is the richest province in the entire Philippines, Ateneo professor Danny Gerona, Bikol's foremost historian, said in a recent lecture. But as Norman Owen's seminal work on the subject showed, it was by and large prosperity without progress as the industry built around that key commodity enriched the traders but not the local communities that hosted the vast abaca plantations feeding it.  

    By: Willy B. Prilles, Jr.