2 Pinays get Navy diplomas from Obama

MANILA, Philippines - Two Filipinas among this year’s graduates of the US Naval Academy in Annapolis received last week their diplomas from US President Barack Obama, a report on abs-cbnnews.com said yesterday.

Christine Joy Jiao Layug of Oakland, California, and Chinna Louise Eulogio Salio said their graduation from the naval academy was a great source of pride, according to a report from ABS-CBN’s North America news bureau.

Layug’s father, grandfather and 10 uncles are either actively serving or retired from the US Navy.

Layug said she chose to go to Annapolis even if she already had an ROTC scholarship because she believed that no other university or college in the US gives the unique training, discipline, and academic and physical challenges.

Her mother said Layug had always dreamed of going to Annapolis.

Layug was in the dean’s list and graduated with honors in her major applied mathematics, and opted for a sub-specialty in operations analysis.

She said her next stop is basic flight school in Pensacola, Florida but she also has a Burke Scholarship to the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. 

Layug said she wants to have a long and illustrious career in the US Navy, staying beyond the minimum five years after graduating from the academy. Meanwhile, Salio, who was born in Mountain Province, was previously taking up a nursing course when she veered sharply to the Philippine Military Academy, passing the entrance examinations in 2008.

In her sophomore year she took the competitive tests for the US military service academies and landed at Annapolis, where incidentally, her younger brother Kendrick is also now a sophomore.

When Kendrick graduates, they will become the first Filipino siblings who are alumni of the US Naval Academy.

Salio, a champion marksman in her class, was also a scholar at the Philippine Science High School (Cordillera campus). 

After the graduation rites at the Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium, Salio was commissioned as an ensign in the Philippine Navy by Capt. Elson Aguilar, the concurrent defense and naval attaché in Washington.

She is scheduled to return to the Philippines where a warm welcome awaits her, both at Navy headquarters and from her family in Baguio City. 

Joining the US Navy has been a career pursued by Filipinos ever since President William McKinley signed an executive order in 1901 authorizing the recruitment of 500 Filipinos in the US Navy.