To all the graduates here today congratulations.
To all the parents congratulations too.
To all the teachers, a job well done.
I am sure that everyone here today would have prepared a little food in your homes or reserved a table in a restaurant to celebrate graduation day. That is how we Filipinos celebrate graduations, by preparing food, a little get together and some music. Some might even have dancing til wee hours in the morning.
We should however remember that this is not the end. This is not the finish line. This is not the end of the book of learning but merely another chapter. As this chapter ends another has just started. Who knows if the next chapter will be easy read as was the previous one, we do not know.
Your generation is quite lucky to have been born at a time where information, education and entertainment are at the tip of your fingertips. I grew up at a time where I had to go to the library to do my assignments, read for a couple of hours and make notes long hand. Today we can just pay 15 pesos for an hours worth of downloads and printing. (How many of you have every used the library?) (Who knows where the library is?) Now we merely click on our computer mouse and the information is available to us instantly and yet it seems students are not up to the kind of immersive learning.
Why do we study? Why do we learn? What compels your parents to spend hundreds of thousands of pesos to pay for your education? (Oh yes it is as expensive as that). It is to have a secure future, to have a job, to have money, to have family, to have work, to live comfortably.
The real world is highly competitive with the number of graduates growing every year hence employers are looking for the best of the best. (Are you one of the best?) If not it is not too late. You are only graduating from elementary… you still have high school and college or vocational school.
How much education do you need? As much as you can and for as long as opportunity presents itself. To become a lawyer or a doctor you would need at least 18 years of formal education. And yet there is someone who has more education or experience than you and they would be at most more favoured. How long did I go to school in all at least 27 years and yet I would find difficulty in finding a job. Some would say that we don’t need an education to succeed… they would say look at Bill Gates or Erap they didn’t finish college and yet they succeeded. Yes but you are not them, they are peculiar, they are different from us. They had different opportunities available to them which is not available to us.
An education arms us, gives us weapons to succeed in a competitive world.
Never stop learning. Grab every opportunity that presents itself. Seek scholarship. Never falter, never stop. Work hard.
Never forget to be grateful to your teachers, to your parents and to God.
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It has been more than fourteen years ago, when I too together with my batchmates held a pin and ring ceremony much similar as this one. I am sure that many of you would attach more significance or meaning to this ceremony than the actual graduation rites which necessarily would follow next week. This ceremony is full of symbolism and meaning that many of you graduating students and parents might not recognize or simply do not notice. You might think that this is merely a special closing program for the College of Nursing to separate it from the graduation rites. You want a ceremony on your own where you do not become lost in a sea of flowing black robes and tasselled caps. However, this ceremony has more meaning, there are significant symbolism in this ceremony which have been lost as it was hidden by tradition or merely because it was misunderstood. In this ceremony we have the ring and the pin. What do these things symbolize? In marriage, the wedding ring or band, symbolizes commitment and love which never ends. The class ring however symbolizes school pride. Emblazoned and engraved in the golden ring is the name of your school, on the inner side it you may have your names engraved. The ring thus signifies that you are a graduate of the institution of the College of Nursing of Benguet State University. So wear your rings and be proud of the institution it symbolizes. The pin, on the other hand is a symbol of your profession, the congregation of men and women who share a common bond of tender loving care (TLC). That is what the nursing profession is known for isn’t it? Tender Loving Care. I belong to the law profession, known to be a manly profession where we fight for the cause of our client, where we are taught to be ruthless and to take advantage of the weakness of our adversary, sometimes without mercy but it does not shame me to associate myself to the profession that espouses Tender Loving Care. I am proud to say that yes I am a registered nurse and a graduate of Benguet State University In the nursing profession there are many symbolism whose meaning has been lost or are in danger of being lost. One is the nursing cap, once the symbol of nursing, it is slowly losing its significance. I remember seeing pictures of nurses in the 70’s and eighties whose caps were huge, and I mean big like the bowl of soup good for four people. These were carried around in big containers which one would think to be a big lunch box. Then I saw it evolve to become tinier and tinier until a time when it could already fit and folded in an eyeglasses case. I also no longer see it being used by nurses in hospitals; you can no longer distinguish the nurse, from the doctor, nurses aide, med-tech or pharmacist. The distinction of the cap is being lost. (Imagine me wearing a cap, and no longer will I be mistaken for the doctor). Another symbol also being lost in the nursing profession is the caduceus, the rod with the snake or snakes which was an ancient symbol of healing. This symbol is being used nearly by every medical-related disciplines. Even veterinarians might be into it . The meaning of the symbols we carry are being lost either because the representation is passé or outdated or that we forget to remember the original meanings associated with it. From the nightingale lamp, the cap, the caduceus and now to the white heart which is the international symbol being adopted for the profession of nursing. What troubles me most however is not that these symbols are evolving but rather that the perception of what the Filipino Nurse symbolizes is. The reputation of the Filipino nurse has been built by individuals who dared to venture out of the Philippines at a time when going abroad was not the norm but rather the exception. In the ensuing years as these people asserted themselves in the profession, Filipino nurses were known to be industrious, well educated, proficient and good natured. A lot of employers wanted Filipino Nurses. The trend however is waning, Filipino nurses are losing their edge in the world-labor market. We now have competitors from the near east countries of India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and also from the European Union like Poland, Georgia and the Ukraine. Why are we losing our edge? Because Filipino Nurses are losing the reputation established by the pioneers. We now hear of Filipino Nurses described as incompetent, negligent, lacking the technical knowhow but most of all of Filipino Nurses who no longer have the Tender Loving Care attitude. The proficiency of the Filipino Nurse is being marred by the allegations of cheating in the board examinations and that the Philippines is now becoming known as a diploma mill for nurses. We might argue that still we are better than most but the situation is exacerbated by the political and economic policies of the European Union nations where they share resources and prioritize hiring from their co-member state. Unfortunately ladies and gentlemen we are not EU members, we are halfway around the world from them. Our country is not an exception in this phenomenon. Even among our own people there is a growing derision for the nursing profession. As the population of nurses and would be nurses grows we cannot avoid being at the forefront of attention. When previously it was only the Philippine Bar examinations which was thrust in the limelight now even the Nurse Licensure Examinations comes to attention, not because of prestige but because of the sheer volume of examinees. Others: 1) Sheer number of unemployed nurses. 2) Government Employees taking up nursing 3) Doctors taking up nursing 4) Now lawyers taking up nursing 5) Role reversal, when parents wait for their child, a nursing student, from 11 pm duty to the child who waits for her mother, a nursing student coming from duty. We are being ridiculed not only because of this freak show but because of the perception of people of our nursing students. Complaints from professors abound about how students are no longer driven and motivated by the desire for excellence but rather for the sake of only passing the subject. It is a shame that upon my personal experience a number of students of nursing no longer recognize the meaning of the symbols they carry. Their uniforms stained by the drips of sauce from appetizers and spilled beer, or reeking from the smell of smoke from cigarettes. We now not only see nursing in Operating Rooms or Emergency Rooms but also more and more in VIP rooms in the bars in Baguio City. Nursing students no longer recognize that they stand on the shoulders of those who have come before them and that they have the responsibility to uphold the reputation of the profession. But today you have received the symbols of the profession with whom you wish to associate yourselves with. By accepting these symbols, you are actually accepting the essence of what these symbols represent. To be proud of our alma mater and to accept the responsibilities of the professions for which we worked hard and still work hard to become a member of. Although I do not longer wear my college ring, not because I don’t want to, or choose to but because it no longer fits my fingers which have become stout it does not mean I am not proud of my school. But it is not always necessary to wear your ring to show school pride, nor is necessary to show off your symbols to be recognized as a member of a profession. These things can be manifested by our actions, by the distinction we receive in the practice of our profession. It is by your own actions that you give meaning to the symbols which you have received today. The fate of the reputation of the Filipino nurse and nursing profession lies not in the hands of a few dedicated individuals but by the collective action of everyone. That is the mission you are charged with today, be the best that you can be, show them what a graduate of the College of Nursing-Benguet State University can be. Go out into the world and make us, your teachers, mentors and colleagues proud.
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