A Good Sign.pdf

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Part of The Gold Ore

extracted text: EDITORIALS A Good Sign Our Faculty The charges that have been made that some colleges and universities are dip loma mills are not entirely without foundation. It is unfortunate that some such private schools forget their roles as educational institutions by accepting more students than their facilities can absorb. This leads to the formation of classes too big even for the most learn ed or talented instructor to handle. The resuit is inflation even in education. This is a responsibility they cannot es cape. They declare that matters cannot be helped in view of the money-making tendencies and proclivities of members of Boards of Trustees. This is a poor excuse. In fact, it is no excuse at all. Having small classes is an essential condition for efficiency in instruction. Even a genius cannot be expected to suc ceed with a class of 100 or more stud ents. With the opposite, a class of 45 or less, the students are forced to study whether they like it or not. At least they are asked to recite once a week or oftener. In some colleges where the c asses overflow into the corridors one is lucky if called upon three times in the quarter. Small classes, in the final analysis, give the students the distinct advantage of personalized and indiv idualized instruction. Our Administration has persisted in its policy of keeping classes small, notwithstanding the advice of Private Education officials that lecture subjects like the social sciences need not be divid ed into small classes. For a college which has just started, and which needs more enrolment to bolster it up, this is a good sign. The best sign that educa tional values will not be sacrificed for financial profits, no matter what. From long experience, only a ve teran educator can say that two im portant cements make up a university. So to speak, a teaching staff which knows how to teach and a student body which is open-minded and ready to be taught. The University of Manila’s M. V. de los Santos on the occasion of his convocation speech says so. And adding: “These two elements are here” —in our Bagpio Colleges. On the whole, our faculty members and instructors can really teach. Dean 'T'eodosio Buenaventura, Mr. Angel G. Baking, Atty. Ramon P. Mitra, Mr. Fernando Bautista, Dr. Horacio Mon zon, etc., are not very big names. Side by side with the well-paid name educa tors, professors, and instructors of pri vate universities in Manila, our faculty does not look impressive. But, from actual instructional efficiency, our line up can compare favorably with the cream of all the universities and colleges of the country. Comparatively speaking, we are only a small but growing college. This being the case, student-faculty relations are close and cordial unlike those in wellpopulated Manila universities. Every faculty memebr calls us literally by our first names. Sometimes even, he comes down from his mentor’s perch and fraternizes with us—like father to son, a mother to a daughter, or as man to man. We wel come this relationship. As a matter of fact, we appreciate it. But there are limits. On our part, we should be careful to always respect the faculty as our superiors in education, (Continued on page 2 ) THE GOLD ORE Page 1
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