Universitas Rewind presents an excerpt from Dr. Rina Villegas’s original article published in the May 1999 issue of Universitas. Dr. Villegas joined UA&P (then Center for Research and Communication) in 1987 as Chairman of the Institute of Development Education (IDE). When the IDE became the School of Education (or SED, now School of Education and Human Development ) in 1994, she became Assistant Dean of SED and Academic Director of the Master of Arts in Values Education (MAVE) Program.
The first half of the article deals with the 1980s efforts of the education leadership to resolve the dilemma of moral decadence and moral freedom in the Philippines. These efforts led to two mindsets and policy thrusts: (a) the teaching of values education as a separate subject in the high school curriculum and (b) the integration of values education in all subjects in the curriculum.
As we consider the origins and concept of values and values education in Philippine education and in the Filipino mindset, I must underscore the reality that the University of Asia and the Pacific has a tremendous responsibility and opportunity to give education in values a broader perspective. Values education and education are really the same thing.
Let me now propose some broad parameters for education in values.
I would like to think of education in values as no different from education of the mind in truth and the heart in love, hence no different from education. There are, in every subject in the curriculum, aspects of reality that invite us to understand and to love. These aspects are the values inherent in the subjects, inherent in the fields of learning.
In basic education—grade school and high school—truth is studied and understood in the Sciences, in Social Studies, in the subject Values Education, in Religion. In college, the same truth is studied in its higher levels of refinement and complexity. In basic education, the tools to study and understand truth are honed in English, in Filipino, and in Mathematics. In college, these tools are further developed for technical competence in the student’s field of specialization. In basic education, greater sensitivity to truth and love is aimed for in Literature, Arts, Music, and PE and Sports. In college, these sensitivity channels are pursued with greater depth and wisdom. In our College of Arts and Sciences, the Applied Integrated Studies (AIS) provides students with concrete opportunities to appreciate the impact of what they learn in class, thereby enabling them to understand and love truth with growing extension and intension. In our academic community, the entire lifestyle is a further channel of education in truth and in love.
And the integration of values in the different subjects? This is simply the recognition of the specific contribution of each subject or field of human knowledge to understanding and loving the truth. Mathematics is similar to English because both deal with the tool of language, and thus with comprehension and expression. One is different from the other, however, because of the characteristic of their respective material (numerical and verbal). These differences bring about “accidental” differences in values to be stressed: flexibility and openness for English, rigidity and accuracy for Math, for example. Social Studies and Science both deal with reality; but they differ in theme (society and the natural world) and hence, with the values they may stress: freedom and its nuances in Social Studies, precision and constancy for Science. At bottom, all integration of values in subjects is nothing else but teaching and learning a subject with all the richness of the aspect of reality it touches. It is not as though values are a different reality from the subjects and are thus to be integrated or made part of the latter. Values are an inherent part, if not the foundation, of any human enterprise: of human resource development; of work skills training; of setting up a business; of institution building; of building and rebuilding a culture; of efforts toward excellence, of efforts at quality instruction, home-school collaboration, community development, general well-being, and arts and culture.
In the University, the humanities program, which so richly introduces the student to his field of specialization, gives him a holistic perspective of his future profession but always against the backdrop of a fuller reality. Humanities helps the student mature in his understanding of the value(s) of his person, of his family, of his university, of his immediate community, of his work, of his relationships, of the world community. With these values deeply rooted in his psyche, excellently taught to him by his teachers, and by the living environment of his university, he enters the professional world with clear and sound criteria to face small and big decisions that life will challenge him to make.
This is the ideal we try our very best to sustain at the School of Education (SED). Let me focus on the Master of Arts in Values Education (MAVE) first, because this has been the School’s biggest and most formidable channel for values education and, second, because the experience with MAVE has clearly and firmly demonstrated the universality of values.
One of the “always” clarification points for SED people is that MAVE is not a masteral program intended only for teachers of the Values Education subject in grade school or high school.
In a nutshell, MAVE aims to provide the wherewithal for an integral development of the teacher, the educator. Intended for educators who have exercised palpable influence on the academic or local community, the 14 month program seeks to form the student to be catalysts of personal and social development in their respective milieus. The program’s success hinges on four basic elements: (a) a highly personalized education and strong family ambiance; (b) a humanistic curriculum founded on universal values that transcend culture and religion; (c) a research thrust among the students, immediately implementable after graduation, that fosters a strong local color; and (d) a continuing follow-up of alumni in their personal and professional concerns. The program has produced more than 500 graduates from 73 of 77 provinces in the Philippines. All alumni have had a sron multiplier effect in their respective communities.
The never-exhausted anecdotes of the hundreds of MAVE alumni in the field, from Batanes to Tawi-Tawi, are an eloquent testimony of the impact of deliberate and deeply personalized values education among men and women of goodwill. Philosophy of Man, Foundations of Values Education, Foundations of Social Order, Foundations of Education, Fundamentals of Family Life, and other eminently practical, value-laden subjects come to life in the heroic day-to-day decisions they make; their concern for the personal and professional development of fellow educators and other people in their immediate environment; the things they say or do by themselves or in the presence of others. Current issues and social concerns that the graduates subsequently encounter in the field are better appreciated and internalized even in their nuances and in their most basic dimensions. All these within the vast richness of the Filipino race reflected in our varied but equally majestic ethnic cultures.
The MAVE alumnus sees value in every development opportunity. Through one’s capacity to reflect, one can take full advantage of this opportunity for the sake of individual men and women, boys and girls one meets at home, at work, in the community, and everywhere.
In the MAVE program, therefore, values education goes beyond curriculum, subjects, or other formal and non-formal interventions that the school provides. It goes to the deepest intimacies of the person: his personal life, his maturity, and his aspirations and their realization.
MAVE finds its cohesive application in the education sector nationwide through the National Culture of Excellence (NCE), a channel that enables various sectors: academe, private business, the education leadership, parents, teachers, students, the military, government leaders and workers, and other citizens to promote the awareness and constant practice of excellence at work, at home, and in society. It is deemed as an efficient vehicle of Rebuilding through Education, of shaping the social environment for the good of all, for the development of people. NCE seeks to have excellence characterize every human endeavor, school subject, activity, and project, with human development as the ultimate goal. In NCE, values education is at the core of the entire enterprise, but seen in the contextual realities of school management, parenting, teaching, community development, and student formation.
MAVE is 10 years down the road today. We continue to see the relevance and urgency of the program for Philippine education and social education. The program has found its niche in cultivating educators with a firm and steadfast grasp of universal values, determined to ensure that these values be consistent with their personal lives, and with the wherewithal to help others understand and live values.
What we perhaps have to envision and strive for now is an even more intense and rigorous education of the MAVE students in building a culture of excellence in their teaching, research, and extension work. They need to expand the frontiers of knowledge through a more mature and constant study of social situations and the crafting of more rational interventions in education in values. MAVE has been strong in forging the heart, the will, and the struggle to uphold personal integrity, family solidarity, civic responsibility, and universal charity. The students and alumni would certainly be more effective catalysts of change if they have a deeper understanding of people development, better research and communication skills, and a stronger grasp of the values of reality and its manifestations through the different subjects in the curriculum. The two other hallmarks of the University are definitely channels to make this come true.
To end, values and values education can serve as the guidepost of all education, and thus, the unifying element amongst diverse groups, communities, and nations. Values form the backbone of any human enterprise, including universities. The Values formation hallmark that we are celebrating today is an expression of our commitment to the universality of human dignity and human aspirations, and our recognition of the reality of individual differences and the capacity of man to transcend these differences through values.
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