By Atty. Antonio P. Pekas
I have been talking in the past about the writing achievements of our only son, Jan vicente “JV” Balingan Pekas. Now here is the real thing any parent who has a kid in college has been waiting for. We learned yesterday he is one of the graduating students of the Mass Communication class of the University of the Cordilleras this current trimester. That fact alone is good enough for us parents.
I learned though he has no latin honors as he was a transferee from the University of the Philippines where he finished his first year. While he got good grades there, he transferred because he was not allowed to shift to another course due to restrictions attached to the free tuition fee program of UP. At any rate, he graduated as a Dean’s Lister for this third trimester of the year and was recognized for two awards—or what the university could invent according to JV—as “Print Journalist of the Year” and for “Excellence in Column Writing.”
Certainly, he has the advantage as he had been writing for this paper during his later years in high school. The validation of this having got something from that was what I wrote about a month or two ago where he won the impromptu writing contest of their university on Opinion Writing even if he forgot to place the title of this piece.
After receiving his diploma on the 25th day of this month, the acid test if he really learned something in college is if he could apply such in practical life. Hopefully, otherwise, all would be for naught.**
