2010 UP ALUMNI COUNCIL MEETING SERIES

Presentation to the 2010 UP Alumni Council Meeting, June 25, 2010, Ang Bahay Alumni, UP, Diliman, Quezon City

By Dr. Judy M. Taguiwalo (BSSW'70cl; PhD'07), UP Faculty Regent

I belong to UP Class 1970 which is commemorating its 40th jubilee this year. I would like to share with you the wonderful news that I received my senior citizen card last February and am now looking forward to enjoying the full 12% VAT exemption starting July 6 when the expanded VAT law is implemented.

I would like to thank the UP Alumni Association for giving me this opportunity to look back  to the time when we were young and strong and having senior moments was the farthest thing on our mind. .

What were some of the images and sounds of my undergrad days in UP Diliman The Catholic Chapel and UPSCA, the first organization I joined during my freshman year in Diliman;  miniskirts and colored net stockings for the women, the shirt jack and pencil pants for men, British pop songs and pop groups  with the Beatles leading the pack, Neil Armstrong announcing from the moon “ one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind”, the national euphoria over Gloria Diaz selection as the first Filipina to be crowned Miss Universe, the earthquake which turned to ruins the Ruby Tower in Manila.

But there was uniqueness not only in the culture but also in the politics and mood of those times. There was massive disenchantment with the capitalist model of development which had put the market as the key to development and a  premium on material goods and individualism. This disenchantment would partly account for the upsurge of social movements whose content and global magnitude was staggering:  the anti Vietnam War movement, the civil rights movement, the women’s liberation movement and the student rights movement  in  universities worldwide.

2010 UP ALUMNI COUNCIL MEETING SERIES

Presentation to the 2010 UP Alumni Council Meeting, June 25, 2010, Ang Bahay Alumni, UP, Diliman, Quezon City

By Dr. Ramon Ma. G. Acoymo, BS'79cl; BM'88mcl; PhD'05

An academic institution of Music has, broadly, a triple mandate.  In the light of conventional wisdom that any academic institution ought to fulfill its roles and responsibilities in the dimensions of teaching, research and extension, a college of Music includes in its research dimension the creative endeavor;  that is, "new" knowledge in the form of original works that are symbolized in traditional manuscript form containing symbols used in the "Western" (European and American) "classical" or "serious" genres and idioms such as notes, clefs, key and time signatures and rests written on staves and measures usually associated with the "Common Practice Era" (that music created during approximately the years 1600 through 1880 to the present day:  the Baroque, Classical, Romantic through the Modern and Contemporary periods of Music History) or other alternative symbolisms; and in its extension work the "re-creative" endeavor - the act of "performing", or executing the physical symbols and symbolisms of the creators of music (the "composers").

A College of Music as one that exists in and at the University of the Philippines has in my view a broader and more transcendent aim contextualized, operationalized and concretized through the aforementioned triple mandate the continuation, strengthening, improvement, enrichment, enhancement and otherwise betterment of the state of knowledge of the academic community and ideally of the music-consuming public that enables this community and public to make better and more educated decisions regarding the music product alternatives available and how and why certain choices among these alternatives can and may be made.

In its making available, dissemination and presentation of pedagogical, research (including creative) and extension (including re-creative) outputs a College of Music considers as an ultimate accomplishment the illumination of the music consumer's ability to discern superior over inferior;  more desirable over less desirable music products, whether these products for the choosing are presented in the mass media or in more exclusive venues.