Carillon is published by the
University of the Philippines
Office of Alumni Relations
In Memory of Lived Honor, Excellence, and Service:
Prof. Leonardo de Castro and Dr. Priscelina Patajo Legasto
By Kristine Cruz
Prof. Leonardo de Castro
More than excellent iskos, the University’s mission is to mold alumni who can take or create space to do great things and inspire change. The UP Office of Alumni Relations (OAR) honors two (2) amazing alumni whose memoirs were lived honor, excellence, and service within and beyond their stay in the University.
Prof. Leonardo de Castro, or Sir Deca, as his students and colleagues fondly called him, was the Director of the UP Office of Alumni Relations from 1984 to 1989. He was a bioethics pioneer in the Philippines and has led the field in other countries since its inception. He served as chairperson of the Philippine Health Research Ethics Board –the national body that sets policies and regulates research ethics committees in the country and was a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Biomedical Ethics of the National University of Singapore. Sir Deca also served in other international organizations such as the Asian Bioethics Association where he was president, UNESCO International Bioethics Committee where he served as Vice-Chair, Forum for Ethics Review Committees in Asia and the Pacific where he also served as Vice-Chair, and a Bioethics Consultant to the United Nations, the World Health Organization, the European Union and the European Commission.
Aside from the many hats he wore, he also wrote and co-wrote multiple publications such as “The Ethics of Organ Transplantation: Shortages and Strategies” (2009), “Poverty and Indigenous Peoples” in The Sage Handbook of Health Care Ethics (2011), “Organ donation in the Philippines: should the dead do more?” (2014), and lastly, “Age matters but it should not be used to discriminate against the elderly in allocating scarce resources in the context of COVID-19” (2020) which was published in the Asian Bioethics Review. This last paper talked about the crucial implications of how the elderly should be treated during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dr. Priscelina Patajo Legasto
Prof. Priscelina P. Legasto, our pillar of Philippine Studies, spent more than four decades teaching and writing about Philippine Post-Colonial Studies, Comparative Literature, Philippine theatre, and feminism in the country. During her time at the University, she also served as Assistant Vice President for Public Affairs (May 2002-February 2005), Director of the UP System Information Office (May 2002-April 2005), and the Director of the UP Office of Alumni Relations (January 2003-February 2005).
Her passion for teaching was recognized multiple times through the UP Diliman Gawad Chancellor bilang pinakamahusay na Guro (1996), the Gawad Chancellor bilang Natatanging Guro (2010), and the Gawad Leopoldo Yabes bilang Pinakamagaling na Propesor ng Kolehiyo ng Arte at Literatura (2001). In addition, she also received recognition as the first Dean of the joint Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities and Faculty of Science and Technology for creating a community of scholars, teachers, artists, and specialists of new technologies from various constituent universities to further establish and strengthen the UP Open University programs.
Some of her research and literary contributions include Philippine Postcolonial Studies: Essays in Language and Literature (UP Press, 1993, 2004) with Prof. Cristina Pantoja-Hidalgo as co-editor, Sarswelang Pangasinan (Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1996), Filipiniana Reader: A Companion Anthology of Filipiniana Online (UPOU, 1998), and of course, Philippine Studies: Have We Gone Beyond St. Louis? (UP Press, 2008).
Both Prof. de Castro and Prof. Legasto left legacies in their respective fields and it is an honor for the UP OAR to have had a fraction of their lives in the seats, activities, and hallways of our office. They have led changes, started beginnings, and created new spaces for more people to do great things. And isn’t that what being an isko is? Truly a lived honor, excellence, and service for the nation and the world!