Following its promise to engage its stakeholders as partners for good education governance, General Santos City invited the Synergeia team once more to fully-hone its School Governing Councils (SGC).  They know there is much work to be done but Mayor Ronnel Rivera remains steadfast that he motivated the SGC members to be more active partners of the community in creating a brighter future for the children.

In the follow-up activity last March, the agenda for Gensan’s SGCs was clear – learn process skills to organize their teams in order to become functional and effective.  They want to be able to address issues like difficulty of finding qualified and willing officers, lack of teamwork, disruption in programs due to the yearly election of SGC officers, misconception ofSGC roles and responsibilities, insufficient funds and resources, among others. 

They learned about developing teamwork, mapping the community for membership in the SGC and pointers on how to make meetings productive.  They learned to differentiate goals and tasks as prelude to their action planning activity. 

During their action planning exercise, they brainstormed on the needs of their learners.  They identified specific interventions and activities that will support their school’s priority programs and improve students’ learning performance.  The different SGCs shared their plans during the plenary.   Most of their proposed projects focused on initiatives such as parenting workshops, remedial reading sessions, livelihood seminars, resource mobilization for facilities improvement, SGC organization, and health and wellness activities.

At the close of their workshop, the SGC participants shared their insights and their learnings.  Some of their takeaways include the significance of good teamwork, having a strong and sincere commitment to serve one’s school, knowing the roles and responsibilities of a SGC officer or member, the value of school-barangay partnerships, knowing the needs and priorities of the schools and students, addressing the problems one at a time, and showing respect to one another to promote harmony and camaraderie. They pledged to bring these nuggets of inspiration when they go back to their respective schools and work on an active SGC.

Before heading out, the participants gave their wish list to the city government.  School heads asked foradditional instructional materials for the conduct of their reading programs. There were requests for capacity-building on project proposal preparation to help schools in resource generation.   They also suggested to organize an SGC federation for the entire City of GenSan.

There was a lot of excitement and energy as the Hugpong program rolled out its sports for peace activity.  One can feel it and see it from all the boys and girls of Amai Pakpak CES, Bae Inomba Blo Bacarat CES, Abdulazis ES and Sultan Conding ES who participated in the activity.  It was their first time to learn how to play soccer.  We provided them with footballs, and with green and orange reflectorized sports vests.  They excitedly donned their colourful sports vests as soon as the coaches signalled the start of their training activity.  We were lucky to have professional football coaches, 2 of whom coach the national football team popularly-known as Philippine Azkals, who volunteered to teach soccer to the children.  Much appreciation goes to Valenzuela City Councilor Rovin Feliciano who heads the sports program in his city, for helping us bring the coaches to Marawi City.  

Doing sports is a good and proven way to teach about values to children.  Councilor Feliciano started the activity by talking to the children about the value of sportsmanship.  Because soccer is a game, the children could become competitive but they should remember that there are rules of the game and one must play with fairness and with respect for the other team.  It is also important to have team spirit and discipline.  One team may win and another may lose, but winning or losing should be an inspiration to players to even become better. 

In the actual training, the students were grouped into smaller groups and Coach Mark and the other coaches trained each group on the basics of soccer.    They practiced running while holding the hands of their team mates and forming a human chain.  This way, they learned to move as a team.  After much running, Coach  Mark introduced footwork.  They learned   ball   dribbling,  passing, receiving, shooting and  topping  using  foot.     Each  student did  as many ball touches  as  possible  to practice  his/ her  legs  and  feet.  

The students experienced playing an actual game.  The coaches gave final  reminders  to the children on  their  goal, their positions and the  do’s and don’ts.  From the blowing of the whistle to signal the start of the game until its end, there were a lot of running, foot dribbling, shouting and laughter.  The school children watching around were  cheering for their friends  and classmates.  

It was a well-spent day as the dust had finally settled in the school’s outdoor gymnasium.

A seagull, the lapay is a common sight in coastal  areas.  Lapays seem to wait to welcome the fishermen when they arrive with their catch.  Lola Felisa Tupas of Bantigue town in Masbate  was so captivated by the lapays’  graceful movements that she and the fisher folks choreographed a dance that imitated the birds’  movements.  The dance mimicked the fluid flapping of the birds’  wings, their graceful swoop  to kiss the sparkling waves and  their playful  frolicking by the coastline.    Their lapay  dance seemed an engaging portrait of the community’s simple but happy way of life.     

The lapay dance, now recognized by the Cultural Center of the Philippines as onf of the official folk dances of the country,  was brought to Marawi when the USAID Hugpong program and Synergeia rolled out its dance for peace activity.   Members of the Ramon Obusan Folkloric Dance Troupe of the PICC came to teach the children of Marawi the lapay dance.  Five dance  workshops  were  held last December at the Lanao Provincial Capitol, in Matampay ES, Poona Marantao Primary School, Sikap ES and Angoyao ES for 1,005 students.   

The children learned the basic lapay dance steps.   First was   “lupad”  where  arms fluttered in a   graceful fashion as  in  flapping  of wings.   Then  the “tuka”  which is  a pecking motion with back bent moving forward and backward.   Next  is the “kumintang” which entails  rotating  of  hands and wrist while  turning  and  twirling.   Other  steps  required  moving   sideways, forward and backward, stomping,  jumping and  gliding.   

At the start of the workshop, the children  were  quite reserved  with their  movements.  They were not familiar with the dance because it is not of Maranao origin.   But as they learned the steps, they started to enjoy the dance.  They became more expressive with their movements and their steps followed the fast beat of the music.  They were quick to memorize the sequence of the dance steps.  They seemed to be dancing as free as a bird – flapping  wings,   flying forward, backward and sideways,  bending, stomping,  gliding,  jumping,  twirling and turning.   When they learned the entire dance, they became very happy and excited.  They embraced their classmates and smiled at their teachers.

The dance workshops were a joyful learning and bonding experience for the Marawi children.  Dance is truly an effective instrument for healing and for peace.