Personal effects such as swimsuits, towels, hats, toiletries, medicine, golf clubs if you wish to play golf and tennis/squash rackets/balls for tennis/squash enthusiasts

The following will be joining the R&R

Agustin	Luis	ECCE
Angeles	Marilou	ECCE
Asis	Mike	Theology
Billena	Jared	Biology
Cabral	Noel	Math
Cacha	Lleuvy	RL
Capuno	Rex	ECCE
Cardenas	Karen	ORP
Chainani	Ed	Chemistry
Chua	Sandra Jean	DISCS
Choa	Vicky	Fin and Actg
Corpuz	Annie	RL
Cueto	Waldette	RL
Dayrit	Toby	Dean, SSE
De la Cruz	Alma	Psych
Domingo	Eurlyne	Math
Garcia	Wash	CGO
Gonzales	E-yes	Educ.
Intal	Miren	VPLS
Guico	Ma. Leonora	Chem
Guidote	Armand	Chem
Guillermo	Mida	Math
Ibarra	Vi	Fin and Actg
Langas	Mia	CGO
Magcamit	Lina	CGO
Mendoza	Lara	English
Montejo	Estela	RL
Montiel	Tina	Psych
Moscaya	Joemar	Filipino
Olinares	Paul Dominic	Chem
Olpoc	Bong	DISCS
Orendain	Margot	English
Pangan	Oliver	CGO
Prado	Renan	Mod Lang
Porio	Emma	Socio-Anthro
Puente	Alex	English
Puente	Detdet	Psychology
Que	Russel	ECCE
Respeto	Jerry	Filipino
Rodriguez	Guss	Fac Dev
Rojas	Nina	Chemistry
Rosales	Chita	ADAA
Sabug	Jun	L and S
Samson	Cristy	RL
San Andres	Rene	ADSA
Santos	Beni	Dean, SOH
Sarmiento	Jume	Math
Sayaboc	Mary Ann	ECCE
Siojo	Carla	AVPLS
Tamino	Annette	Biology
Tanchoco	Chito	QMIT
Teh	Lota	Psychology
Valle	Jovie	CGO
Valera	Nestor	Chemistry
Veric	Charlie	English
Villanueva	Matet	unknows

Cross-reference: 2003.10.24#3

Instead of breathlessly enumerating all the different things we saw today, let me tell you a story from our rest and recreation.

After our light morning snack, Gus told us about an "infinity pool", or a pool with invisible borders that seemed to make it part of the sea view. Gus, Charlie (was it Charlie?), Dr. Tejido and I decided to go to the club house to check out the pool before lunch. They offered to send the vehicle. We thought the walk might help us develop a healthy appetite in time for lunch, so we confidently headed in the direction of the main entrance.

The uphill climb worried Dr. Tejido, though, and he returned to the beach club after a short while. Gus, Charlie and I continued - intrepid explorers setting out to check if the facilities were suitable for the other faculty!

We made our way along Punta Fuego Avenue while chatting about the beautiful houses we passed and speculating about the social sins committed in order to accumulate such wealth. We even debated the wisdom of having the R and R at such a ritzy place, as a lot of teachers might decide to quit and join the industry seeing the fruits of other people's labors. They were somewhat puzzled that I hadn't gone into the industry, but I explained to them that I really enjoy teaching and we commiserated our mutual pecuniary possibilities.

The walk was longer than we expected, although signs here and there encouraged us to continue. We joked about having to reassess the feasibility of our venture, but we continued walking - probably because the conversation was fun and probably also because we'd gotten that far already.

When we were halfway to the main entrance gate, Gus remembered that he had maps of Punta Fuego. He brought out a copy and handed it to me. I quickly scanned it and realized we were going in the wrong direction. In fact, the club and the entrance gate were at opposite ends of the complex. At first, the other two were incredulous, but I pointed it out on the map and we resigned ourselves to the idea of walking back. Oh, boy, how we ribbed Gus about getting lost! =)

We still managed to check out the main club before lunch, thanks to a lift from another in our party. All said, the conversation was well worth the walk.

Again, let me tell you stories from this one.

If you went to the National Conference on IT Education (NCITE 2003), I hope you didn't miss Cherry Sta. Romana's plenary talk on Data Structures: From Structured to Object-oriented. She is clearly, inspiringly passionate about computer science education. A dean of the Cebu Institute of Technology, she told stories of how the industry and the academe are working very closely together in Cebu. The companies there rather vocally complain about the lack of qualified graduates; apparently, only 5% of the CS and IT graduates are employable. To address this, they formed an organization that conducts training and development.

Object-oriented programming is one of the areas this foundation focuses on. Many computer science teachers are new to object-oriented design and programming because they've only been exposed to the structured programming paradigm. Even when they teach object-oriented languages like C++ or Java, their design is still fundamentally structured - functional decomposition, algorithm-centered design, and haphazard data sharing. As a result, neither teachers nor students develop an appreciation of object-oriented design principles. Straight OOP is intimidating because it presents many new concepts at once. Cherry presented an alternative approach - an intermediate step focusing on programmer-defined data types in any languge, even languages that do not explicitly support object-oriented programming. This allows people to gradually transition toward thinking of programs of data + methods while working in a language they know well. With that background, they will be able to appreciate the features of OOP languages like C++ and Java because these languages enforce the rules they had consciously followed.

Not only was her topic useful, her delivery was also captivating. She was fast and confident, she used slides effectively, and she kept the audience interested. I have so much to learn from her!

In other news:

Without doubt, Mario is a natural performer. He might have a lisp that can be distracting in one-on-one conversations and he might have a hard time preparing slides, but once he's in front of an audience, he's all set. =)