UV eyes changing academic calendar

CEBU, Philippines - In line with its mission to produce globally competitive graduates, the University of the Visayas administration is eyeing to also adjust its academic calendar.

"The university is considering a change in our academic calendar just like what other top universities like UP, Ateneo and UST are doing.  We want the university to be at par with global standards and changing the academic calendar is one way to go about it," UV President and former Cebu 1st District Rep. Eduardo "Eddiegul" Gullas said.

Gullas said he is looking at an August-May academic calendar but added that studies are being done to help the administrators make a decision.

He said he already commissioned UV's Center for Research and Development to do a quick survey about what the students, their parents and the faculty members think of the implementation of a new school calendar.

The initial survey, conducted last January 8 to 9, with 369 students, 10 parents and 77 faculty members as respondents, revealed that the university stakeholders still prefer a June-March school calendar. A total of 70 percent of the parents, 75.38 percent of faculty members and 66.49 percent of the students who were respondents of the survey said they "strongly support" a June-March school calendar.

"We will be conducting more studies about changing the academic calendar so that the administration's decision will be backed by a scientific study," Gullas said.

Aside from preparing students for global competitiveness, Gullas also said that the increasing number of foreign students in UV is also one of the reasons why the administration is considering a change in the academic calendar.

At least five courses offered by the university, he said, have quite a number of foreign students. These are Medicine, Dentistry, Pharmacy, Nursing and Engineering.

"If ever the university decides to change the academic calendar, we would implement the change for the 2015-2016 school year yet. This is to give us time to make adjustments. I want to make sure that hitches that will come up because of the change will be addressed. If we push through with the change, there will be a break that is equivalent to two summers. What will happen to the teachers? We want to address that first," Gullas explained.

The Commission on Higher Education granted UV an autonomous status, giving it the privilege to determine and implement its own academic and curricular programs to achieve global competency. The autonomous status, given in July 2010, will be in effect until July 2015. — QSB (FREEMAN)