ACED, Security Bank Foundation Inc turn over school buildings to 3 Negros Occidental schools

Last October 6 and 7, 2022, Dr. Carmela C. Oracion, Director of the Ateneo Center for Educational Development (ACED), traveled to Negros Occidental to attend the inauguration of new school buildings as part of the partnership between ACED and Security Bank Foundation, Inc. (SBFI). These newly constructed buildings were turned over and blessed through a simple ceremony and were donated to the following schools:

1. Gov. Emilio Gaston Memorial Elementary School in Silay City, Negros Occidental
   • (two-storey building with four classrooms)
2. Victorias National High School in Victorias City, Negros Occidental
   • (two-storey building with six classrooms)
3. Kabankalan National High School in Kabankalan City, Negros Occidental
   • (two-storey building with four classrooms)

All this was made possible through the “Build a School, Build a Nation Program” which was conceived in 2010 when Ateneo De Manila University approached Security Bank Foundation, Inc. to explore a partnership program for public schools. Upon learning about the problem of shortage of classrooms in the Philippines, SBFI responded by constructing school buildings and classrooms in partnership with various community stakeholders, with the desire to raise the quality of basic education in our country. These efforts began with an initial target of constructing  60 classrooms within the first five years from project launch, just in time for Security Bank’s 60th year celebration. This target has since been surpassed as the project continued over the years, having funded the construction of over 700 classrooms to date.

In this partnership between the ACED and SBFI, ACED’s contribution is to design and implement training programs for the principals and teachers in the various schools with newly donated school buildings. The initial target was to provide training to 300 teachers per year. They have greatly surpassed this number, having already been able to train over 10,000 teachers since the start of the program. 

All these efforts to uplift the quality of education in our country have grown and flourished and SBFI has since partnered with De La Salle University to train teachers in other schools which are not covered by ACED's 500-school network. The DLSU-SBFI partnership started in 2014.

At present, efforts are being placed into finalizing the training program for 120 school principals coming from the various schools where school buildings and classrooms were donated by SBFI. The goal of the said training program, which is a partnership among SBFI, ADMU-ACED, The HEAD Foundation, Singapore, and University of Nottingham, is to empower and upskill these school principals in order to further the mission of improving our country’s quality of education.