The College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences conducted a seminar with the theme: Indigenous People’s Education Training : Integration of Indigenous People’s Studies/Education into Relevant Higher Education Curricula, in accordance with CMO No.02,s. 2019 held at the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CAHSS) Building, Zamboanga City State Polytechnic College on June 27-28, 2019 with a primary purpose of addressing issues confronting the country’s indigenous people.
The two-day seminar was participated in by eighteen teachers handling the following core subjects; Arts Appreciation, Understanding the Self, Contemporary World, Ethics and Reading in the Philippine History. The seminar aimed to integrate IP’s in all these subjects by carefully scrutinizing topics in the syllabus. Teachers are trained to be professionally and mentally equipped with new teaching methodologies and strategies as they embark in the threshold of new challenges comes school opening.
Dr. Robert V. Panaguiton was the resource speaker during the first part of the seminar. A Doctor in Anthropology and currently the Dean for Research at Ateneo de Zamboanga University, he emphasized that in 1997, Individual People Rights Act (IPRA) attempted to integrate IP’s in Higher Education Curricula. He stated that several factors contribute to the need of this integration, such as poverty, human rights abuse and education.
The participants were given intensive exposure on this topic through presentations and discussions rendered by the expert – Dr. Panaguiton. It was an ideal opportunity for teachers to study a topic in depth and gain a wide range of knowledge concerning IP integration by elaborating questions, taking detailed notes and being open-minded about new ideas.
The speaker was very patient and accommodating in guiding
the participants during the outlining and integration of topics in identified subjects, plenary presentations, critiquing of the syllabus, revising, improving and polishing of course outlines.
Indigenous people are known as first peoples, aboriginal peoples or native people or ethnic groups who were the original settlers of a given region. In Zamboanga City we consider five main groups of indigenous peoples; The Yakan, Subanen, Kalibugan, Badjao Dilaut and Bangingi.
