The good thing about working in an international school is the fact that you get to have so many rest periods during vacations and holidays. Having been left idle with nothing to do as it was summer break, I got the chance to resume to the routine that I so much enjoyed doing when I was still in college- staying up late and watch dvd as long as I want, read books by authors I so much admired, sleep without ever thinking of the next thing to do and go anywhere my feet take me.
During this past two weeks, I frequented my alma mater to catch up with friends ( most of them are in law school) and follow up a certificate from my college office. Despite the stories that I have heard about the changes in my school- nothing has really prepared me in seeing them first hand. I was happy and both sad as I marveled at what is San Beda today and what it has become.
One's miliue is defined by the generation that molds it. Like the changing palatives after every elections in the country, the campus embraced every single transfomation that its new administration installed as if its impetus was to subtly erase things that reminded the community of how things were during the erstwhile generation.
Like any imposition in a support based unit, the initial reaction to these changes was resentment. This is expected in campus as the bureaucracy is quite central to the wisdom of the elite few chosen by the abbott-a trait that has endured any Benedictine institutions for hundreds of years. While change is inevitable because of this- there are so many things that are left unclinched and unfathomable no matter how an average reasonable stakeholder like myself put it. Or even, are these changes really necessary for the greater majority or is there an intention to malign certain sensitivities for the long term survival of the school as based from the exalted wisdom of a few?
The students rallied, members of the community did their own form of protest(ever wonder why processing things are slow?) as it was witnessed and felt by the world within and outside Mendiola. The point is nothing can ever make the decision makers ever bow down to the whim of a voiceless majority. Not only will it hurt their ego, but it is a poor management style to retract decisions previously made. Even before San Beda is your's and my school- it soley belongs to them and they can do whatever they want in this side of the universe.
Yes they can do whatever they want. Armed with their legion of sentinels of the law in their side so as to make everything well grounded. They can impose lousy unattractive uniform for the students; they can remove the publication fee to marginalize the school newspaper; they can fire staff members under the cloak of insubordination; they can abolish departments and remove the most intelligent, wise and brave of faculty members; they can repaint the campus red and make it look like Sogo; they can install new departments no matter how impractical and unecessary; they can cut funds of organizations; they can be practical and have the canteen consigned to outside entities to earn more profit; they can deliberately increase tuition fees even if the economy is failing; they can control student rights and the list goes on and on.
I can only hope for the best as I am now outside the school. I could have braved the odds in my own way should these things happened during my generation. But I can only do so much. I am only an alumni who once passed this institution and has yet to prove anything worthy like the one's in the walls of our alumni office. My one peso worth of advice or word will only be left unheard and unnoticed. Whatever happens, the present generation of Bedans are in the most convenient and proper foot to creatively do something. This is their milieu and they decide what their generation will do.
I miss old school San Beda. The school that I will always be proud of. No matter where life takes me- I owe so much to this school that has molded me academically for more than a decade. I miss the brotherhood, the academic environment and the people. I am both happy and sad. I am sad because things will never be the same and what is left in my school are the shadows of what it was during my stay. I am happy, because somehow there is change no matter how uncalled for and unexpected they maybe. Change signifies life and so does it go on.
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