(good karma)

Date: Wed Sep 17 14:24:33 2003 +0800

Dear Sacha,

First of all, thank you for your presentation at PSITE’s first national IT Student Congress. As a member and officer of the PSITE national Board, I believe we were privileged to have you.

Second: I think that perhaps when you and I were born, someone had wished for us the traditional “May you live in interesting times.” My life has been very interesting so far, fascinating even. Presentations like yours add to that fascination. To quote you —- “So far, I’ve explored it as a possible direction for student projects, with some project suggestions along the lines of accessible technology and Filipino speech synthesis. Personally, however, I don’t feel that I’ve learned enough about it to give researchers and policy-makers a useful idea of wearable computing.” Many teachers serve as inspirations or advisers to their students. Many teachers are on the lookout for and are very interested in new project ideas. They are no less interested in project suggestions as students are. Industry, on the other hand, has always been interested in opportunities for involvement with students, for opportunities to have students accustomed or acclimatized to industry’s products and practices. If your presentation could provide the representatives of academe and industry with ideas for collaboration to support student learning, I believe your presentation would already be well worth attending. As for the policy-makers, if your presentation could highlight the benefits of allowing students to delve into projects which may seem, at first glance, impractical or even outrightly fantastic, and still allow them the possibility of a passing grade at the end, your presentation would already have served a worthwhile purpose.

This is the era when we should all be extremely excited about being different, about being new, about being unique. We should not be afraid to break out of the confines of tradition. We should certainly not be punished for our willingness to take on the risks of adventure and exploration. I think that your presentation will provide our audience with an initial dose of “risk-taking vitamins” —- a supplement that is much required in this day and age.

We will be very pleased to have you among our presentors.

Thank you.

Regards,

Peach Tinio Director-in-Charge, IT Education Committee Philippine Computer Society