Author: Leo

In mid- November, Vic and Ric, the Goducate agricultural consultants from Iloilo visited the newly extended model farm to give our workers a short training session. Workers and volunteers soon got to work preparing plots and raised beds and planting a wide range of vegetables, including sweet corn, bell peppers, tomatoes, calamansi, papayas, string beans, bittergourds, “pechay”, okra, eggplants, and cucumbers. A return visit was made in early December to assess progress.

The scanty rainfall meant that much effort had to be put into manual watering of the plants. The efforts have been rewarded, with some of the plants starting to bear fruit by mid December.

The farm has also been experimenting with hydroponic gardening, or the use of water and a nutrient solution rather than soil for the growing of vegetable. This method saves on weeding and the use of expensive fertilizer. In addition, no tracts of land are needed. The plants can be grown in trash such as plastic bottles and Styrofoam containers.

Goducate’s mission is to help the needy help themselves. But we would also like them to give to other needy people what they themselves have received in the way of teaching, training, and mentoring. In this way a movement is created, so that each group of beneficiaries can become leaders who go on to transform the lives of others in need.

Many of the youth in Laguna who have benefited from the Goducate music program are spending much of their free time training newer music students. Some train students in their own town or village, but some travel a distance to do so.

Take 14-year-old Matthew, for instance. He walks 3 km on Saturday afternoons to Mabakan area to teach 4 students the violin on a voluntary basis. However, sometimes the mothers pool together to give him PHP150 ($3.40). When Channel News Asia was there filming the Goducate students for part 2 of Once Upon A Village, a program that will be aired in the next month or two, he was asked, “What is your goal for your students?” He replied, “For them to use the talent I share in pursuing their dreams and ambitions in life; like the hope I’m seeing after I finish high school (to get into a college school). I want them also to go abroad like me and experience the life in some other countries”. He was referring to the 10 days of training he had in Singapore, for which he was selected during the filming of part 1 of Once Upon a Village early this year.

Another example is Melissa, also 14, who also used to go by bus to Talahiban to train some students, but since her family moved there, she has more time to spend on teaching. She has 8 violin students, and 5 who are learning the recorder, but who hope to progress to some other instrument later on. The students are so eager to learn that they are often still at the learning center at 10 pm.

Despite the rain and the threat of a typhoon (Typhoon Washi, known locally as Typhoon Send, which later claimed more than 500 lives in southern Philippines), over 200 people attended Goducate Orchestra’s “Concert for a Cause”, which was held in a public park in front of the municipal hall in Bay, Laguna. The aim of the concert was to raise support for the orchestra’s high-school or college students in 2012. The amount raised through sponsorships was PHP 33,700 (more than the target of PHP30,000), which is sufficient to support 4 college students in a year.

In his welcoming address the Municipal Mayor commended the orchestra and the impact it has made on the lives of young people, and he encouraged parents to send their children to our learning center.

The audience was also given a brief history of the formation of the orchestra.

Among the performances was an item by our recorder players, who came from 12 villages.

The event was filmed by Channel News Asia for part 2 of their series Once Upon A Village.