A Thank You Letter From Our Scholar

One of our scholars, Asriel, recently sent a testimonial about his life as a student and, after reading it, I could not help but realize just how much sacrifice it required from a lot of people to be able to send him to school. 

It required the sacrifice of his family, like his sister who had to stop her own schooling so Asriel can continue his own. Or his parents, who would have preferred having him under their roof so they can make sure he is always safe and out of harm's way, but instead had to let him go and spread his own wings so he can get a shot at a brighter future. His parents must have been imagining all sorts of crazy things happening to their son (what torture that is for any parent!), but had to keep their faith that he is taken care of and he will soon be able to achieve his life's ambitions.

It required the sacrifice of his Ates and Kuyas (who are in no way biologically related to him but still thought of him as family), who spent a number of Saturdays going to and from the mountain barangay where Asriel used to attend High School, just so they can prepare Asriel and his classmates for college entrance exams. More than the weekends, they also spent countless days and nights thinking of ways to help Asriel and his fellow scholars get through the 3-year term in CITE, from making pabaga (becoming shameless) in looking for sponsors for tuition money, thinking of ways to bridge the gap between the scholars and their parents, to facilitating the many hangyo (pleas) from the scholars to the school during the times when their parents could not pay for their share in the school fees. (You can read one Ate's testimonial here, which she delivered as a speech during CITE's Scholars Day last August 2015.)

It required the sacrifice of his sponsors, the JamJar Angels, who had to shell out hard-earned money just so they could help underprivileged students they never even met, instead of spending it on themselves as a reward for their hard work or on their family who should have been their top priority.

It required the sacrifice of Asriel himself, who had to endure going up and down the hundreds of steps in CITE almost every day, burning the midnight oil studying for exams, and scrimping on food just so he can get by on the allowance that is afforded to him.

But, I must say, all these sacrifices paid off. Asriel and his fellow scholars' lives have begun improving. Asriel now has a job, receiving quite an impressive salary for someone who has not even officially graduated yet, and he is able to send money to his parents back in Palompon. And this is just the beginning. We have all contributed to laying out the foundation for the road leading to a brighter future for Asriel and his fellow scholars. It may have been bumpy at times but at least it is going forward.

So for everyone's sacrifice, this is Asriel's thank you:

I just cannot express my sincerest gratitude that one at a time, unpredictably I should say, I am achieving my goals in life.  I know that I need to eat more rice and still have a long journey to experience as I am at my teenage stage just yet, but I have to say that I feel satisfied and happy already of these great opportunities and blessings that I have right now. And without any doubt, I dedicate all these possibilities to all of you. 

One time, a supportive teacher of mine asked and suggested to me which college I would go to.  I said in a phlegmatic way, “With what we currently have right now, it does not matter for me, as long as my family, who has made and helped me all the way, is there to support my endeavor.”  But I did not exactly think of those words, it all came out just like how I was brought to CITE.  I never anticipated or imagined studying in this school, worst case, studying in college.  Seriously, I am the first of eight siblings to attend college and it has been a great achievement already.  Yes, I can say that we are not blessed with all those material things, but with this inspiring bible verse from Hebrews 13:5 “Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for He has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you.” it always reminds me to live simple, contented and thankful with all that we have.  But I have my ambition, I know what I want and I am going get it.  It always seems impossible but that does not mean I will give up; I will go for it until it is done.  

So I courageously applied, enrolled and studied at CITE for 3 years.  I never thought of giving up or losing hope; rather, I firmly believed and looked forward to all my goals.  Yes, there were times when the world seemed to cease me, just like the tragedy we experienced from the earthquakes and deadly typhoon, but it made me stronger and discover life at its best. 

To my ever supportive and lovable family

You are my inspiration, you believe in what I can still be.  Your sacrifices and struggles push me harder. You never fail to remind me that life is not fair but also remind me how important it is.  Especially to my sister, for being my rock when I needed it most, for supporting me and sacrificing for me for three years of our lives here in Cebu.  Thank you for providing me with a sense of strength and resilience that very few could ever carry as well as I have.  My parents, who kept on guiding and showing me what determination really means.  Thank God, a great lesson that life has taught me is that, sacrifice and suffering is a good thing when it is done for the good of the family.  

To my funny and dedicated friends and brothers 

We have gone through a lot of struggle and pain, but because of your presence, my life here in Cebu seems so easy   It is very nice to have sincere and genuine people around you.  Our advices to each one, funny thoughts and worthwhile sharing of happy and crazy moments, our ‘tita tita and BB gurl BB gurl’ expressions just make me smile and laugh every time.  I pray that God will give us the strength and wisdom to continue the good that we do.  

To our Ates and Kuyas 

We are overwhelmed and touched by your generous acts.  You certainly influenced and motivated us in reaching our aspirations in life.  You always remind us how appreciable life is.  Thank you for your unconditional support, advices and care.  You teach us to be confident in what we are doing and make sure we never lose track of our hopes and dreams and that we should fight for every single thing we want in life.  Thank you for advocacy and being a part of our lives.  God will continue to give you fruitful blessings.  

To the kindhearted JamJar Project Angels 

I wish I could name and meet each and every person who has helped in providing me the change to take on what is ahead.  Awarding me as the JamJar Project Scholar has lightened my financial needs, allowing me to focus more on the most important aspect of school.  Your generosity has inspired me to help my family and sister who is now attending school, but was helping me at first.  I hope one day I will be able to help students to achieve their goals just as you have helped me.  

I am now currently working as Probationary Survey Programmer at Survey Sampling International (SSI) and at the same time, reporting as a student once a week in my school.  With God’s grace, hopefully I can graduate this coming November and can continue for regularization in my work.  

Just to end, again thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Like always, I pray that God will continue to bless all of you, and I thank you for choosing to share your blessings and paying it forward.

~Chacha ☺

Message for CITE Scholars Day 2015

By Dara Lynn Rivera-Go (For the 7 August 2015 Scholars' Day at CITE, Talamban, Cebu City)

CITE Officers and Trustees, Management, Faculty and Staff, Distinguished Guests, Grantors, Parents and Scholars, Good Morning!

I was recovering from a surgery when Sir Marlon Valencia (here) e-mailed me and said, “Hello, Ma’am! How are you?” I said to myself in reply, “I’m good!” Then I read on and saw on the last paragraph,“I included your name on the list of possible guest speakers for our August 7,2015 Scholars day in CITE.” Oh, Sir Marlon! I was almost feeling fine, but suddenly I am feeling sick again. Please reconsider. But I guess they will not let me get away for free. So, here I am. I Surrender.

I am Dara Lynn Rivera-Go. A biological mother of none, but an adoptive mother of 80 CITE scholars.

10 years and 10 pounds ago, I started coming to this Scholars Day event, with 10 aspiring young students and 10 hopeful parents from families belonging to the lower-income stratum in Palompon, Leyte. I came with my husband Emerson and my friend Glen just as individuals who made it our personal mission to assist promising but financially challenged high school graduates to achieve their big dream of a post-secondary education that will equip them to find jobs that would enable them to be self-sufficient and to improve the lives of their families and their communities as well. It was a leap of faith.

For most of the parents, it was their first time to ride a boat, to come to Cebu and to cross the busy streets with their“kalderos” and “binugha” (pots and firewood). With no clear picture yet of what to expect of their journey with CITE in the next three years, they just put their trust in God, in CITE and in us as their guide. Their neighbors were even telling them, “Hala! Ibaligya gyud na inyong mga anak didto sa Cebu.” (They will sell your sons there in Cebu.) Then they would simply answer, “Ah, dili man pud siguro mi daganan nila Ma’am.” (They will not abandon us.)

GRANTORS

Year 2004… We were just a bunch of young engineers in our mid 20s who wanted something productive to do on weekends when we started a Free Tutorials Project to fourth year high school students of a national high school in a remote barangay in Palompon, Leyte. Every weekend, we zealously went to the school even when it was raining and the dirt road became muddy and bumpy. We passionately carried out this project side-by-side with our busy work schedules and our MBA schooling.

Year 1 was fun and fulfilling! But when we started Year 2, we felt a little frustrated when we saw some of our former tutees out of school. So we thought there must be something more we could do!

Back then, while we continued with our Free Tutorials Project and invited more volunteer tutors to join us, we explored other options. But I had my eyes on CITE. I believed we could work out something with CITE. I believed that with CITE we could take a slice in giving opportunities and hope for a brighter future to the youth who belonged to the low-income bracket families in our community.

Mr. Wally Ong, a former CITE faculty who was also employed in PASAR for a time before he came back to CITE, became our key. In 2005, we requested him to introduce us to CITE. So he introduced us to the Scholarships Officer back then, the late dear Mr. Jun Capuyan. And there our love story with CITE began.

For our first six Scholars Days, we trailed behind the CITE faculty as they entered the auditorium, feeling red-faced and wanting to pass unnoticed, if that was at all possible. Though we were always filled with excitement, we always felt abashed and funny because we were not a formally registered association. As I said, we are simply a bunch of engineers who believe in the same cause for education. Though working and busy, we go looking for scholarship grantors and match them with our students. For the past 10 years, we have successfully invited more than 10 scholarship grantors to CITE. One of them was PASAR Foundation, to whom we are thankful for the significant support they gave us.

PASAR Foundation journeyed with us during our first six years with 10 scholars. And now, 8 of our scholars are currently employed in PASAR, including some scholars of PASAR officers who also became scholarship grantors themselves. There used to be 10, but 1 left for further studies and another 1 recently left for a very good offer abroad. 2 of the currently employed are now enrolled in ETEEAP, hopefully to be sponsored by PASAR. Moreover, another scholarship grant which we are proud to have brought to CITE is the scholarship put up by our Batch 1 scholars as their way of paying it forward. As they successfully completed their education in CITE through various scholarships and gained stable jobs, they in turn put up a scholarship to give the same opportunity to other scholars. Their scholars graduated in 2013.

On our seventh Scholars Day, when the Scholars Day was held in Cebu Doctors University Reclamation Campus, by God’s grace, my husband and I finally became scholarship grantors ourselves through the Perpetual Scholarship Fund. At the same time, our very dynamic collaborator and friend Charisse started the JamJar Project. The project came about when it was becoming challenging to look for full sponsors. (hashtag) #crisis. The concept of the project was for our colleagues, friends and family to share a little to create the JamJar Scholarship fund. It also goes by the saying, "A little by many can do so much." Like CITE, we also believe that only through collaborative efforts could we attain financial sustainability. Some gave P50/payday,while some gave more. For the past three school years, through the JamJar Project fund, we were able to send our STOP participants to CITE practically for free. It has been supporting 1 scholar in full, who will be graduating come November. It has also received donations in kind from which our scholars benefited. AND today, we are happy to share with you that the JamJar Project is already a Perpetual Scholarship Grantor here in CITE (after the MOA is signed).

I believe that each Grantor here has chosen to take part in educating a scholar in CITE for the same conviction as I and my friends have. We all believe that by being grantors and collaborators in CITE, we support if not enable its mission "to provide training in technical skills and entrepreneurship, values formation,health and social services to the less privileged youth, their families, the local community and the industrial sector of Visayas and Mindanao." Through CITE, we are helping these young men become more competent, purposeful and ethical individuals who will form the professional, skilled, and progressive work force; become leaders for the province and country's businesses, communities, and government; become good citizens of the country and achieve greater self-sufficiency and thus alleviate the lives of their families and communities.

To date, we have 80 scholars in its hallmark program, the 3-year Industrial Technician Program, and hopefully counting. 42 scholars already graduated, while the others are currently enrolled. 10 BATCHES in total since School Year 2006-2007.

PARENTS

We now have over 70 families in our small“community”, which serve as a support group for the families. Each of these families has its own story to tell about their journey with CITE.

Every year we have gatherings like Christmas parties, Mothers' Day celebrations and some other small get-togethers. These are beside the regular Parenting Seminars, which we have successfully requested CITE to conduct for us in Leyte for the past 7 school years. Sometimes, especially during election time,political “analysts” would stop and ask, “Unsa na diha? Rally?” I would jokingly answer, “Yes, indeed!” But, in truth, it is a rally to show support for our cause for education.

Every Christmas Party, we are able to measure the progress of the CITE families. Pag nakatina na, naka lipstick na, ug dako na kaayo ug smile, nakagraduate na ang anak ana. (When the hair is dyed black, lips are colored red and the smile is from ear to ear, for sure the son has already graduated.) Samot pa pag naay dala lechon or lechon manok! Pag wala pa naka graduate, nilung-ag nga saging or camote lang una. Okay gihapon!

Dear Parents, during the three years that your sons will be here in CITE, you will feel one of two things… or BOTH. The first thing that you will feel is,“Kadugay mulabay sa mga adlaw!” Time will go so slowly when there will be challenges, especially financial challenges. When it is the time of the month to pay the parents’ share, when you have to send money for your son’s allowance and boarding house rental, when the allowance you will send will be short and you have to find yet another generous soul to lend you money. There may even come a time that you will have to sell “how-how”, how-how de carabao. God forbid. You may receive a text saying, “Ma, wa na koy gi ka-on. Huhuhu…” (hashtag) #gutom. How those lines would squeeze your heart and bring you to tears. Murag kumuton inyong kasing-kasing ug makahilak mo ug mga tulo ka patak. (hashtag) #heartbreak. “Kadugay mulabay sa mga adlaw! Mahuman na unta ka, dong!”

The second thing that you will feel is,“Kapaspas sa panahon!” Time will pass so quickly when things are smooth-sailing. Your son may receive a scholarship from a grantor, maybe one these generous benefactors who are here with us now. So, it will bemuch less burdensome on the pocket. Orafter four (4) trimesters, mag OJT na si Dodong. He can already help in the expenses. “Maibtan gyud mi ug tunok, Ma’am!” as most of the parents would say. UNLESS nipalit ug nindot na cellphone or nag girlfriend girlfriend si Dodong. Post baya dayon ug picture sa facebook, sweet kaayo. (hashtag) #mayforever. Pero si mama ug si papa na walay facebook,“Ma’am, kumusta na kaha to akong anak? Wala na may text text.” Nagkinaguol. But, seriously, especially at graduation time, you will let out a big sigh of relief, and with a smile on your face, you will say, “Kapaspas sa panahon.”

Dear Parents, always keep a hopeful spirit! Do not give up! Pray sacks and sacks of prayers; sako-sakong pag-ampo and regularly monitor your sons.

SCHOLARS

As for you, dear Scholars, whom this event is really for, my number one tip for you that you should do TODAY is “TAKE ASELFIE!” Yes, you heard me. Take a selfie of how you look now before you start your three-year journey with CITE. Hopefully, only THREE. For now maybe you look so short, so thin and so awkward-looking. But in three years’ time, like our scholars, I assure you, you will already be tall, handsome and confident-looking.

Your journey will NOT be easy. You will have to scrimp on your allowance(mag tipid) just to make sure “muabot sa sunod padala ni mama”. There will be days when kailangan i-memorize na lang ang panihapon or kailangan mag in-Amerkano na lang – kanang pa breadbread na lang. But as long as it is not always like that, you should be fine even with these small sacrifices. Offer these up for good health for you and your family, or whatever intentions you wish to pray for. Perhaps a passing grade. Someday, you will look back and laugh at these times.

(Hashtag) #kasurrenderon. Yes, there will be times too. Just climbing up the 136 steps everyday is already a feat! Those 136 steps are symbolic of the sacrifices that you have to make to reach your dreams.

“Are You Nervous?” Did you memorize that piece during your STOP? I have heard many funny stories from our scholars about their experience in reciting this piece. Saying “are you nervous” while nervously shaking both hands and legs. But really,“are you nervous?” will be the perfect question when your unpaid parents’shares would pile up, when your clearance would not be signed and when you wouldnot be allowed to enroll for the next trimester. What is worse is when “promisory note” would not be honored anymore because you have used up your chances. Murag DMD na ug hangyo, di na madala ug hangyo si Sir Marlon. (Hashtag)#areyounervous. Hangyo lang gihapon and be a good student para maka hangyo. Apil pud gani ko ug hangyo.

Dear Scholars, all’s well that ends well. Whatever challenges you may go through in your three-year journey with CITE, just keep your eyes on the goal! (Hashtag) #ForMyFuture. Never waste a single day; embrace the challenges that may come and do not forget to pray. Let God win your battles for you.

Be grateful for this new beginning. And when it is your turn, make a difference in other people’s lives.

So are you up to the challenge, dear scholars? If you are up to the challenge, your JOURNEY begins today!

Good day.


Sponsors: Individual (MCM 1, TWG 1, LHE 2p, MRR 2p, Christie Chua 1, GDC 1p, Roy-Faye Estrada III 2, James Tovell 2p); Group (PASAR 10, Batch 1 Scholars 2p, JamJar 1)

Goal: #Achieved

And we've done it!

Last November 2014, we set a goal to establish a Perpetual Scholarship Trust Fund with CITE, and although turnout was a bit slow in the beginning, we came through with a great finish!

Finally, after four years since starting this project, we have earned our spot in CITE's Perpetual Scholarship Benefactors board - now redesigned and called a "Beehive": 

And this is the excerpt of the Memorandum of Agreement signed between the JamJar Project (represented by yours truly and Dara Lynn Go) and CITE:

We couldn't have done it without our ever-loyal donors, as well as our new Angels, who have selflessly shared their blessings in order to support this goal. To the following people, THANK YOU:

To each and everyone of us, CONGRATS! And may we all continue to glorify God by #PayingItForward.

God bless us all!


~Chali ☺

Almost There

We are already four years old this June and we are not planning on stopping anytime.

Days from now, the Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE) will be holding its annual Scholars' Day and we are hoping to finally sign the contract for our Perpetual Scholarship Trust Fund by then.

As of today, 29th June 2015, we are just P46,830 shy of being able to achieve that.

Lately, funds have been coming in relatively faster than before. This must be because we added more ways of accepting the donations with the help of technology. Whereas before we had to collect it personally or request the donors to deposit their donations, today we have at least four ways by which you can give your donations:

(1) Online via Bayanihan Project* - it is peso-based and you can use PayPal (http://bayanihanproject.com/projects/the-jamjar-project/);

(2) Online via GoFundMe - it is dollar-based and you can use your debit/credit card (http://www.gofundme.com/TheJamJarProject);

(3) Online of personal bank transaction via BPI - it is peso-based and you can go to BPI Express Mobile on your devices or go to any BPI branch near you. Please send me a message to know the bank account details; and,

(4) Give in person to either Cha Ledesma, Chali Chacha, Dara Go, Emerson Lemuel G. Go, Glen Ceballos, Gil Martin A. Guape, or Franklin Vios.

Let's pray that more generous hearts will help this cause! 

When we are blessed with so much, we have to share our blessings with others who don't have enough. Cheers to paying it forward!

~Chali ☺