Mission Possible

“To educate is to transform the world.”  — St. Marie Eugenie of Jesus

Education is empowerment, the one thing that sets many of us apart from that streetsweeper down the road, who is more hardworking and perhaps, just as intelligent.  Unfortunately for the streetsweeper, in a world where only few get to inherit their wealth, and even fewer get to win the lotto jackpot, education, more than luck, is the ticket to a better future. And most likely the streetsweeper didn’t get it, or enough of it.

Assumption mission school in Passi City, Iloilo.

Education is our passport to life’s many takeoffs. And to have received a good education is both a blessing and a responsibility — a responsibility to pass that blessing on.

My late dad Frank Mayor and my mother Sonia didn’t compromise on this, even when times were hard. They saw how Assumption was molding their daughters into their best versions — ladies who had a head and a heart, who knew Math as well as Shakespeare, and set foot in, not just heard of, underprivileged communities that needed their love and attention.

ASEC school director Mylene Gorecho with AAA San Lorenzo president Marlu Balmaceda.

Social responsibility was as much a part of Assumption Convent life as Science and Araling Panlipunan were. Not just “tusok-tusok” fishballs in the park (as the urban legend went), but to be able to cook fishballs ourselves in soup kitchens when needed.

Assumption alumna Pia Gan Uygongco (seated, extreme left) welcomes AAA San Lorenzo to her beautiful home. In photo are (seated) Assumption Iloilo Superior Sister Jo Concepcion, r.a., former teacher Lina Divinagracia, Sister Marge Amistoso and Marivic Gan; (standing, from left) Pilar Villanueva, Dr. Chinkey Velayo, dean Ola Regala, Marlu Balmaceda, the author, AAA Iloilo’s Buday Falcis, Margie Duavit and Nena Fule.

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Even before she became the president of the Assumption Alumnae Association, my former editor (of the school paper, Facets, and The Star monthly magazine) Marlu Villanueva Balmaceda encouraged me to serve in the AAA board, with “serve” being the operative word. While with the board, I saw, and am still seeing, firsthand how the alumnae have built not just schools — but lives.

Last week, some officers of the board saw for themselves how the financial support the AAA has been giving for the last 50 years to the “mission schools” has transformed communities.

A warm welcome from the students of Assumption Socio-Educational Center in Barrio Obrero.

 We visited two Assumption mission schools in Iloilo — in Passi and in Barrio Obrero — and saw in living color how education has opened up new worlds to those who could have been blinded by the absence of it.

Marlu recalls, “It was a learning experience filled with pleasant discoveries. What we used to imagine has now become more tangible; what was once vague, now made clear.”

For instance, we discovered that the very first graduate of the mission school in Antique became the Archbishop of Jaro. And that the mayor of Passi City, a very progressive city, once went to the Assumption mission school in Passi.

Assumption School Passi’s administrative team. (From left) Leonard Tejada, Belinda Panes, Stella Grace Tagnong and Junald Paclibar.

The Assumption Socio-Educational Center in Barrio Obrero, which is turning 50 years old, started with one building, and is now a riverside campus of several buildings, a chapel and a huge gymnasium. The learners’ tuition fees are subsidized and full scholarships are also given.

During our visit, the schoolchildren welcomed us with songs and dances, making Marlu remark that she felt like a “rock star.”

Assumption Alumnae Association San Lorenzo and Iloilo officers (standing, from left) Dr. Chinkey Velayo, Buday Falcis, Happy Uy Bico, dean Ola Regala, Jong Pijuan and Margie Duavit; (seated, from left) Marlu Balmaceda, Marilen Rivera, Dr. Karen Francia, Nena Fule, Pilar Villanueva and the author.

One of the learners (as the school’s students are referred to), Romaine Eugenie Gonzales, put it most succinctly when she expressed gratitude to the AAA for “sharing your life with us.”

For indeed, the “Old Girls,” as the alumnae are fondly called, have not only given their proverbial “time, talent and treasure.” They have given of themselves.

As the Assumption’s founder St. Marie Eugenie once said, “Love never says I have done enough.”