By Ian Zane T. Esparaga | February 12, 2021
Silliman University is preparing its initial steps for the limited face to face classes, as it waits for the approval of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) regional office.
Last January 25, the Association of Philippine Medical Colleges (APMC) released a supplemental guideline set for the resumption of the clinical rotation of the post-graduate internship program during the pandemic period.
“The first one to respond to it is the medical school because medical school and other health sciences especially in the fourth year really need face to face, because that’s their world whether with pandemic or not. They have to be placed in a situation wherein it’s almost a real simulation,” Dr. Earl Jude Cleope, University Vice-President for Academic Affairs, said.
An ad hoc committee was formed composed of all the respective deans of the affected colleges. Together with them are the Dean of College of Arts and Sciences, Dr. Mae Brigitt Villordon, and Director for Office of Instruction Dr. Beulah Torres, to mobilize the university’s application on the limited face-to-face engagement.
Dr. Lily Bautista, Dean of the Institute of Rehabilitative Sciences, tried to contact the regional supervisor of all the allied health courses. However, the CHED regional office said there is still no specific instruction on when they will start receiving applications.
For the meantime, Cleope reiterated that they are getting ready and there are a lot of things to be considered.
“Aside from the paper works, another concern is how to prepare our labs and classrooms for this limited face to face including the scheduling. And so the big word there is retrofitting,” Cleope added.
The requirements and protocols of the local and national Inter-Agency Task Force are also being checked. All students must now have Philhealth insurance. The university is also now eyeing the Channon Hall as quarantine facility for students and Davao Cottage as quarantine facility for faculty and staff.
The ad hoc committee and the VPAA would like to assure the studentry, the parents, and the faculty and staff that they are already preparing for it and how they will go about the said “retrofitting”.
“In fact, if not for this approval from CHED, gigil na gigil na ang other units to start,” Cleope told tWS.
The university is hopeful that the allied health programs will have limited face-to-face interaction in the last two months of the second semester.
