Sparking a new love for learning
BY MA. MELIN C.Y. DORIA
OMF brightens up Sitio Pulot Bay Elementary School
with solar-powered lamps.
Manileños would find a journey to the Sitio Pulot Bay Elementary School in Kalayaan, Laguna suggestive of an Indiana Jones movie, including the 45-minute motorized boat ride across Caliraya Lake.
Yet Queency C. Galarosa, the school's Teacher Leader, claims many of her pupils take even more time to get to school. Some walk for an hour over muddy terrain, Others with a family bangka paddle their way across the lake.
Attending classes is clearly no adventure film for the 68 schoolkids, and not having electricity just adds to their difficulties. "The students must hurry home, finish their chores, and complete their homework before dark,” Galarosa explains. "Not many families can afford to use candles or kerosene lamps daily, so children often come to school with unfinished homework."
The Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) helps communities like Sitio Pulot Bay, through its corporate social responsibility arm, One Meralco Foundation (OMF), which joined the "One Child, One Lamp” (Ocol) campaign. This Department of Education initiative envisions one solar-powered lamp distributed to each student in schools without electricity.
"The project targets small schools, located off the grid, with 150 students or less,” elaborates OMF President Jeffrey O. Tarayao." Ocol gives them light to study longer and better.”
The project also receives support from Meralco corporate partners. At the 2016 Meralco Power Club Pro-Am Challenge last November, ticket purchases and pledges from around 150 participating C-Level executives raised P120,00O for Ocol. Part of those proceeds funded the solar lamps for Sitio Pulot Bay Elementary School.
"Among our corporate customers, there is a genuine desire to help,"says Alfredo S. Panlilio, Meralco senior vice president and head of Customer Retail Services and Corporate Communications.
The community sees Ocol as a much-sought-after Christmas gift; Dolores Diones, the Parent-Teacher Association president, got emotional. “I am focusing my energy,” she confides, “on helping my youngest and my first grandchild finish their schooling. None of us in the family have finished school, and I hope these two wlll.”
She confesses it was sometimes difficult to define the concept of liwanag (light) to younger kids. But now that each child has a solar-powered lamp, liwanag will become a normal part of their lives.
"It was like winning the Lotto when we tumod them on the first time,” Galarosa recalls. “We were all teary—eyed."