The Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) Negros Island Region (NIR) Regional Office recently conferred on Foundation University six major distinctions as part of its First Regional Quality Awards.
Held at the Claire Isabel McGill Luce Auditorium, Silliman University, accepting the awards on behalf of the university were Victor Vicente “Dean” Sinco, university president; Glene May Lusares, assistant vice-chancellor; Atty. Jesus Ramon Quevenco Jr., College of Law and Jurisprudence dean; and Stephen Akio Sinco, university digital marketing consultant.
The awards for Foundation University are: Delivery of Student Affairs and Services; Enhancement of the Philippine Anti-Illegal Drugs Strategy; Issuance of Certification, Authentication, and Verification (CAV) and Special Orders (SO); Issuances of CHEd Student Financial Assistance Programs; Adherence to the “Pathways to Equity, Relevance, and Advancement in Research, Innovation, and Extension in Philippine Higher Education,” and Conduct of Community Extension Programs; and, Adherence to the Requirements of the “Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act (UAQTEA).”
Conferring the award was Dr. Raul Alvarez Jr., CHEd NIR regional director, on the occasion of the 5th National Higher Education Day and the 31st CHEd founding anniversary.
Now on its 76th year as a higher education institution, Foundation University was founded on July 4, 1949 by lawyer Dr. Vicente Guzman Sinco, who served as the eighth president of the University of the Philippines and dean of its College of Law. A member of the Constitutional Commission that helped craft the Philippine Constitution, he was a trusted adviser to several Philippine Presidents and represented the country as a signatory of the United Nations Charter in 1945.
Dr. Sinco started the then Foundation College with the mission of “promoting a climate of excellence in the pursuit of new knowledge and life-long learning in the service of society.” Envisioning education that is accessible to all, Dr. Sinco articulated: “We want to educate men and women whose only passport is intellectual competence, whose pursuit is excellence of mind, body, and character, and whose quest is for freedom and truth.” The institution achieved university status in 1969 through an order of the Department of Education.
The university has weathered many obstacles, including the ravages wrought by the pandemic for more than two years. It must be its edge on digital technology that the university has that made it responsive to challenges with enrolment figures showing much better results than those prior to the pandemic.
As education in the 21st century gets to be more innovative and even creative, current university president, Dean Sinco, grandson of the founder and son of former university president Leandro Sinco, expounds: “We have felt that the inclusion of technology in instruction has always been a necessity for the past, present and, definitely, the future. But, it isn’t technology that is revolutionary as the digital devices are just tools. What we have realized is that technology lends itself very well to insuring that information and skills are learned, assimilated, and well implemented when the students are asked to do so.”
With a number of its academic programs having attained Level 2 and Level 3 accreditation status both from the Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges, and Universities (PAASCU) and the Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities Commission on Accreditation (PACUCOA), Foundation University gears for its application to attain autonomous status in addition to being an ISO-accredited higher education institution.
Such is the thrust of Foundation University through these years, manifested among the women and men who have imbibed the university’s mission and vision either as members of the administration, as faculty and staff, as students, and as alumni. | NWI
