The 4th annual UP-UST Friendship Meet saw Speech Language Pathology students from the University of Santo Tomas (UST) and the University of the Philippines-Manila (UP-M) coming together to form friendships and to learn more about their future profession last 11 January 2014, at the Quadricentennial Park of UST. They decided to make it more special by inviting parents and children of the Autism Society Philippines (ASP) and Bantay Bata.
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| UP-UST Students SLP, ASP Families and Bantay Bata group |
With the theme Take the Leap: InSPiring Change One Day at a Time, the event started off with Mrs. Ma. Georgina D. Mojica, CSP-PASP, MHPEd, chairperson of the SLP Department of UST, giving the opening remarks. She welcomed both the UP students and the ASP visitors to UST and commented on how far the SLP education has gone, with the Cebu Doctors University in Cebu City offering BS Speech-Language Pathology as well. She hoped that this will lead the profession farther as well, where it will be able to help more people. Lastly, she wished everyone a successful and fulfilling day.
The event was emceed by Ms. Adrienne Dela Cruz, Mr. Terence Piodos and Mr. Marco Quimpo, and they got the crowd pumped up with a few minutes of exercise followed by a series of games that the students and the children were all eager to join. Finally, after an hour of fun activities, everyone was ready to dig into their lunch. As the crowd ate and got their fill, students from both universities took the stage and performed songs to keep everyone entertained. Raffle prizes were also given before the program officially resumed.
At noontime, the children were escorted into the Carnival by their respective ‘buddies,’ their ates and kuyas from UP and UST. The Carnival is a series of game booths arranged by the fourth year SLP students of UST for the children to enjoy. All the students made sure that the children enjoyed the games as safely as possible. Free dirty ice cream was also available for everyone to indulge in. While the kids were playing, the parents were then escorted into Room 125 of the St. Martin de Porres Building of UST to attend a seminar on the Red Flags for Speech-Language Development by Ms. Joyce Anne Ponciano, CSP-PASP. Social workers from Bantay Bata also attended the seminar and both visitors from Bantay Bata and ASP were very participative and asked a lot of questions. Afterwards, raffle items like household materials, cellphone and gift bags from Blue Magic were given away.
By 2:30, after eating their snacks, the visitors from ASP and Bantay Bata left UST with smiles on their faces. However, the day was not yet over for the UP and UST students. The event continued with more games and team building activities, including an Amazing Race especially arranged by the Collegiate Association of Speech Pathologists (CASP) of UP-M.
At 4pm, everyone went to the Education Auditorium of the Albertus Magnus Building of UST for a talk about the importance of volunteerism and community-building by Sir Ivan Neil B. Gomez, MAED, OT, OTRP, UST-SIMBAHAYAN-Community Development Coordinator of the College of Rehabilitation Sciences. To close the event, Mr. John Arden S. Romanillos, President of the SLP Society, reminded everyone why they were here: to give help to those who need it, to take the leap and inspire change without expecting anything in return because what’s the value of material rewards when compared with a grateful smile?
About the Author: Courtney Chua is an incoming fourth year B.S. Speech-Language Pathology student in the University of Santo Tomas (UST). She served as the Internal Vice President of the UST Speech-Language Pathology Society last academic year 2013-2014
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