News & Announcements

“Spectacular, stunningly beautiful” orchid discovered

December 14, 2020

Donna A. Apolinario, MD

The discovery of a new “spectacular, stunningly beautiful” orchid species in the Philippines was announced today, bringing new excitement to the fields of horticulture, biology, and conservation. The orchid was discovered in Bukidnon by Dr. Miguel David de Leon, a retinal surgeon and field biologist from Cagayan de Oro, and was named Aerides upcmae, after Dr. de Leon’s alma mater, the University of the Philippines College of Medicine. 

The new species was published in the Orchideen Journal by Dr. de Leon along with co-authors Martin Motes, Jim Cootes, and Derek Cabactulan. “There are more than 1,100 orchid species in the Philippines and only 11 of these are Aerides species,” according to Cabactulan, “but Aerides upcmae is the most surprising of all the Philippine Aerides. It belongs to a section that has not been found outside of its range in mainland Southeast Asia.”

Due to habitat destruction and overcollection, it is especially rare to find large and highly attractive orchid species such as Aerides upcmae in the Philippine wilderness. Orchids reflect ecological health and are considered a sensitive bioindicator because they do not tolerate change easily. 

Moreover, the value to the horticultural field of this new discovery cannot be underestimated. Cootes, a prolific author considered to be the foremost authority on Philippine orchids, is confident that “this is an attractive addition to the hybrid ventures of many orchid nurseries. Efforts should be made to ensure that Aerides upcmae is preserved as the most important species that it is.”

For Dr. de Leon, selecting a name was personally significant: “The orchid genus Aerides literally means ‘children of the air.’ Naming this new species of Aerides after the UP College of Medicine is quite fitting for my Class 1995 and all of UPCM are children of our alma mater, schooled and nurtured by her not just for five academic years but for life.

“Academic excellence, moral virtues and selfless service are some of the hallmarks of UPCM. Throughout history, doctors from the college have played key roles in serving our country. During peacetime and wartime—WWII and, now, COVID-19–UP doctors remain charged and ready to serve,” said Dr. de Leon. “It is with deep affection and gratitude that Class 1995 honors its alma mater and all of you who are UPCM with this spectacular species, Aerides upcmae.”

The UPCM Class of 1995 is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. In January, the formal launch of their homecoming year was highlighted by the dedication of two other Aerides species, Aerides turma and Aerides turma fma. anniversarius. The announcement of the discovery of Aerides upcmae was released in time for their final festivities.

Source: https://mb.com.ph

UP Composers Bag Major Prizes in Recent Competitions

December 2, 2020

Joshua Ansale and Jose Buencamino won top prizes in the recently held 2nd International Composer’s Competition “New Music Generation” held in Nur-Sultan City, Republic of Kazakhstan. Joshua’s piece “Ang Ouroboros” was awarded 1st prize while Jose’s “Pinaginipang Hibla” garnered 2nd prize in the Symphonic Composition category for composers aged 15-25 years old.

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In another news, Joshua won the Jovita Fuentes Award for his art song “Kailong Pugad” in the Hiligaynon Art Song Workshop Sponsored by University of San Agustin – Iloilo and National Commission for Culture and the Arts.

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Source: music.upd.edu.ph

UPOU welcomes new set UPOUAFI Officers for 2020-2023

December 1, 2020

Written by Janele Ann Belegal

Edited by Joane V. Serrano

The University of the Philippines Open University (UPOU) welcomes the new set of University of the Philippines Open University Alumni Foundation Inc. (UPOUAFI) officers for 2020-2023. The online election of the  new set of officers was held from 11 to 15 August 2020.

New graduates and alumni of UPOU programs participated in the election for the continuity of UPOU alumni representation in the UP community. Each UPOU alumna/alumnus nominated three graduates. The 10 nominees with the most number of votes were qualified for the Officer positions, the election of  which was held during another voting session with the outgoing UPOUAFI Officers.

Here are the newly elected UPOUAFI Officers for 2020-2023:

The UPOUAFI President is Ms. Ma. Mahalia Cristina B. Marci, a graduate of the Diploma in Language and Literacy Education (DLLE) of the UPOU Faculty of Education (FEd).

Also a DLLE graduate, Ms. Analiza M. Meliton is the UPOUAFI Vice President.

Mr. Herbert P. Samcho is the Secretary, while Mr. Ericson A. Trinidad is the Treasurer. Both are graduates of DLLE.

A graduate of the UPOU FEd’s Diploma in Science Teaching program, Mr. Renzdy A. Mejilla is the Public Relations Officer.

The UPOUAFI Board of Trustees are: Ms. Gloria Antczak, DLLE graduate; Mr. Dominic P. Almirez, DLLE graduate; Ms. Dina Imatong, Diploma in Research and Development Management graduate; Ms. Johnievic Valdez, Diploma in International Health graduate; Mr. Melbourne Piccio, Diploma in Social Studies Education graduate; and Mr. Dhojie N. Yanto, Diploma in Mathematics Teaching graduate.

The UPOUAFI is a non-stock, non-profit organization constituted by the pioneering alumni of the UPOU. Previously called the UPOU Alumni Association, its first set of officers were elected in February 2001, and in February 2006, UPOU Alumni Association became UPOUAFI.

The UPOU Office of Public Affairs (OPA) handles UPOU alumni relations and is the designated office to coordinate with recognized UPOU Alumni Associations during their activities.

Source: upou.edu.ph

Topnotcher twice over: 1st as nurse, now as doc

November 27, 2020

By: Dexter Cabalza

Jomel Lapides —PHOTO FROM MU SIGMA PHI FRATERNITY

“This guy’s gonna top the board exam. Remember the name, Jomel Lapides.”

It was a friendly banter caught on video among Lapides and his batchmates from the University of the Philippines (UP) Manila after taking the board exams for physicians this November.

On Thursday, the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) confirmed that Lapides has again topped the board exams, this time as an aspiring doctor. Nine years ago, he was first in the board exams for nurses, also as a UP Manila graduate.

“I am surprised and still in disbelief. We were only praying that I clinch the Top 10, but Lord gave me more,” said Lapides, 29. “It’s already a big blessing that I passed the board—it’s just a bonus that I was among the top.”

Lapides scored 88.67 percent, followed by Patrick Joseph Mabugat (University of Saint La Salle) and Adrian Emmanuel Teves (University of Santo Tomas) with 88.58 percent; and Tiffany Uy (UP), Hannah Chito (UP) and Chino Paolo Samson (Lyceum Northwestern University-Dagupan City, 88.08 percent.

Mabugat and Teves aced the 2014 board exams for medical technologists and physical therapists, respectively.

Uy holds the record for obtaining the highest grade in UP Diliman’s postwar history with a general weighted average of 1.004 when she graduated, summa cum laude, in 2015 with a Bachelor of Science in Biology degree.

75% passing rate

According to the PRC, more than 75 percent or 3,538 out of the 4,704 takers passed in the only board exams held this year amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The results were released a week after the last day of exams conducted in the cities of Manila, Baguio, Cagayan De Oro, Cebu, Davao, Iloilo, Legazpi, Lucena, Tacloban, Tuguegarao and Zamboanga.

Cebu Institute of Medicine (CIM) in Cebu City was the top performing school with all of its 138 takers passing. It was followed by UP (98.63 percent), Ateneo School of Medicine and Public Health (98.6 percent), Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila or PLM (97.58 percent) and UST (95.61 percent).

Dr. Thelma La Rosa–Fernandez, a board trustee and a former dean of CIM, said the results of the exams did not surprise them.

“We have had a number of 100 percent passing rate in the exams for at least 13 years now. With all the efforts of the administration and the students, we got it again now,” she told the Inquirer.

“I think it’s the way we teach our students. Our faculty is also the best, plus we have the support of the administration,” she said.

‘Time management’

Asked for his secret on being a board topnotcher, Lapides coyly said it was all about “time management” and lots of prayers. “I just set a time where I will focus on studying so after that, I can do other things [like socializing with friends and batchmates] ,” he said.

At the start of the year, he began reading books to refresh his memory of the lessons he already took in his med school years. “Little by little I recalled them, and after succeeding months, I accumulated enough knowledge,” he said.

It also helped him that his study buddy was his girlfriend, a medicine graduate from PLM, who also passed the exams.

After acing the nursing boards, Lapides returned to UP Philippine General Hospital in 2012 and worked as a staff nurse at Sentro Oftalmologico Jose Rizal, its Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences.

He could have been a nurse working abroad and getting paid monthly at least ten times the salary he would be receiving here, but he said he was needed more in this country.

Doctor to the barrio

“I just wanted to serve in our health-care system, but when an opportunity for me to pursue medicine came in 2015, I decided to go with it. I was thinking that as a doctor, I will be helping more people with God using me as his instrument for healing,” Lapides said.

The eldest among three siblings juggled being a night-shift nurse and a med student.

“My father’s pay as a construction worker is not that big. So I promised my parents that I will still provide for the family, and they should not worry about expenses since I would be funding my medical education,” Lapides recalled.

While waiting to take his oath as a licensed physician, Lapides said he was already preparing to go back to PGH’s ophthalmology department to take his residency.

He plans on serving in far-flung communities by being one of the doctors to the barrios.

“I need to be here. People would say that I still can serve if I go out of the country, but as of now, I think this is the Lord’s plan for me. The Filipino patients are here waiting to be served,” Lapide said. –WITH A REPORTS FROM ADOR VINCENT MAYOL AND CARLA P. GOMEZ

Source: newsinfo.inquirer.net





UP-Manila grad tops 2020 Physician Licensure Exams

A graduate of the University of the Philippines-Manila bested more than 3,500 medical students who successfully hurdled the 2020 Physician Licensure Examinations, according to the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC).

Jomel Garcia Lapides garnered a rating of 88.67 percent to finish in first place in the top ten students in the examination that was given earlier this month.

Tiffany Uy, also a UP-Manila graduate and known to break the record of having the highest grade point average in UP in 2015, is in fifth place.

The son of former National Task Force adviser Dr. Tony Leachon, Jolo, also passed the licensure examinations.

Meanwhile, Cebu Institute of Medicine had 100 percent passing rate, which is the highest among medical schools in the country.



Source: gmanetwork.com

Agri chief receives “Lifetime Excellence Award”

By DA

QUEZON CITY, Nov. 23 — Agriculture Secretary William Dar received on November 20, the “Lifetime Excellence Award” given by the Asia Leaders Awards 2020, in recognition of his over four decades of dedicated servant leadership to attain food security, both in the Philippines and in other parts of the world.

Agriculture Secretary William Dar received on November 20, the “Lifetime Excellence Award” given by the Asia Leaders Awards 2020, in recognition of his over four decades of dedicated servant leadership to attain food security, both in the Philippines and in other parts of the world. Photo by DA

“Being a son of farmers in the North, I had never imagined holding a top position in government with the opportunity to serve our farmers and fishers and change their fate,” Secretary Dar said in his acceptance speech.

“I had also never imagined garnering this Lifetime Excellence Award, a prestigious recognition from the Asia Leaders Awards 2020. There is so much more I intend to do for our agriculture sector. Nonetheless, I’m very thankful for recognizing my efforts — and the collective achievements of the Department of Agriculture (DA) — thus far,” he added.

“Servant-leadership is how I have led the past four decades, and how I will be leading the DA in the next two years as we continue to lay a solid foundation for a productive, globally competitive and climate-resilient agriculture,” Secretary Dar said.

“While the ongoing global pandemic makes our work at the DA doubly challenging, I will not rest until the victories I have attained in previous organizations I have led are reflected in the lives of the Filipino farmers and fishers,” he added.

“Guided by our ‘new thinking’ to modernize and industrialize the Philippine agri-fishery sector, we, at the DA, will continue to unlock the sector’s vast untapped potentials and gear it up as one of the country’s primary engines of economic growth. Agriculture will be an attractive sector as a source of income and a hotbed for honing technological sophistication,” he said.

He added that “under my leadership, we at the DA vow to continue performing our duties, anchored on the principles of good governance, transparency, consultative engagement and with a greater sense of urgency.”

A horticulturist by profession and the country’s 45th agriculture chief since June 23, 1898, Secretary Dar was appointed as the first director of the DA’s Bureau of Agricultural Research (BAR) in 1987 by then Agriculture Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez. Thereafter, he headed the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCAARRD), and acting DA secretary in 1998.

He went on to become the first Filipino to lead a global agricultural research center, the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), in India, serving an unprecedented three five-year terms as director-general.

For his remarkable leadership at ICRISAT, the government of India conferred on him the MS Swaminathan Award, India’s version of the World Food Prize.

When he returned to the Philippines in 2014, he founded the Inang Lupa Movement that advocated for the modernization and industrialization of Philippine agriculture.

He was appointed by President Rodrigo Roa Duterte in August 2019, and immediately confronted several challenges like the spread of African Swine Fever (ASF), birth pains of the Rice Tariffication Law (RTL), and falling palay prices, and in early 2020, the eruption of Taal volcano, followed by the global Covid-19 pandemic, and recently a series of destructive typhoons that altogether exacted a heavy toll on the country’s food production, supply, and affordability.

The agriculture sector was considered by the country’s economic managers as the saving grace, as it managed to grow by 1.6 percent (%) in the second quarter and 1.2 % in the third quarter 2020, at the height of the community lockdowns imposed by the government to stem the spread of the dreaded Covid-19 virus.

The Lifetime Excellence Award is the third award Secretary Dar has received this year. Two others were the: “Lifetime Contributor Award” by the Asia CEO Awards; and “Presidential Award” by the University of the Philippines Los Baños Alumni Association.

He is one of this year’s 23 recipients of the Asia Leaders Awards (ALA), whose judges include: Gerard Ho, Singapore ambassador to the Philippines; Norman Mohammad, Malaysian ambassador to the Philippines; Hang Dong-man, South Korean ambassador to the Philippines; Abdulgani Macatoman, Trade and Industry undersecretary; Edward Ling, president of the Malaysia Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the Philippines; and Elton See Tan of the Filipino-Chinese Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The ALA is one of the largest and respected award-giving bodies from the Philippines with awardees from the Asia-Pacific region. It recognizes the exemplary achievements of technocrats and leaders who make a difference in their own organizations, and go out of their comfort zone to help those in need. The ALA recognizes leaders who inspire others to do better, to help others and be the best in their industries, and at the same time, promote the Philippines as a major business hub and investment destination in Asia.  (DA-StratComms)

Source: pia.gov.ph

iAmUPHi and UPAA Iloilo Chapter donate to WVSU-MC

November 16, 2020

Ms. Anna Razel Ramirez

iAmUPHi’s and UP Alumni Association – Iloilo Chapter’s UP Fight Team turned-over three desktops and a computer printer to West Visayas State University Medical Center on November 7, 2020.

These gadgets came from UPHSI alumni and their friends’ donations through the iamUPHi “Fight for Frontliners” campaign. This campaign started in March 2020 when the region and the rest of the world battled with the Covid-19 pandemic. The efforts of the group continue up to now.

iAmUPHi batch representatives Marge Tamayo (UPHSI Batch 2004) and Dr. Aretha Gacutan (UPHSI Batch 1984) received the donations, which were then handed over to Dr. Dave Gelito, Chief of Hospital, WVSU Medical Center. The units will be used at the molecular laboratory of the soon-to-open COVID-19 Testing Laboratory of the WVSU-MC headed by Dr. Anna Sombong. Dr. Joselito Villaruz, a UPV alumnus and President of West Visayas State University, lauded this move and sent his appreciation to the UP Fight Team. 

Source: www.upv.edu.ph

#SamaSamaTulongTulong Bicol Relief Operations

November 11, 2020

Inilunsad ng University of the Philippines, kasama ang UP Resilience Institute, Ugnayan ng Pahinungod, UP Diliman College of Human Kinetics, UP Fighting Maroons, nowhere to go but UP at UP Fighting Maroons, ang #SamaSamaTulongTulong Bicol Region Relief Operations upang tulungan ang ating mga kababayan sa Bicol sa gitna ng sunod-sunod na pananalasa ng mga bagyo.

Para sa mga in-kind donations, maaari lamang po na magtungo sa MBT Coaches’ Lounge sa UP Diliman College of Human Kinetics. Handa ang ating mga volunteers upang tumanggap ng donasyon hanggang Sabado, Nobyembre 14, 8-5PM. Makipag-ugnayan kay Sheryl Ladublan sa 09171902094.

Para sa tulong pinansyal, bukas ang sumusunod na channels:PayMaya at GCash (09278692946)PayPal (https://www.paypal.me/bagyongrolly2020)BPI (NowheretogobutUP Foundation, Inc., Account Number 0993-0113-39).

Ipadala sa Viber (09278692946) o sa [email protected] ang transaction receipt. Maraming salamat po!

Source: UP Public Service FB page

Gonzales is the New Alumni Director

November 9, 2020

Ms. Anna Razel Ramirez

Prof. Rey Carlo T. Gonzales has been appointed Director of the UP Visayas Office of Alumni Relations, beginning November 1, 2020.

Prof. Gonzales is an alumnus of UP Visayas. He joined UPV in 1996 as a high school student at the UP High School in Iloilo. He took his Bachelor of Arts in History at UPV Miagao and proceeded to UP Diliman for his MA History degree. He has been teaching as a professor of History under the Division of Social Sciences, College of Arts and Sciences since 2007. Under the UP System’s Doctorate Studies Fund, he took his Ph.D. in History at the University of Manchester in England and returned to service in 2015. Between 2015 and 2020, he served under the Office of Student Affairs as the Coordinator of Student Organizations and Activities.

Dr. Gonzales will serve a three-year term under the administration of Chancellor Clement C. Camposano.

Source: https://www.upv.edu.ph/index.php/news/gonzales-is-the-new-alumni-director