Ateneo de Naga University has begun a three-year celebration of its 75th anniversary in 2015. University president Fr Primitivo Viray Jr SJ said that they are in the process of looking back at their own history as well as looking forward to the future, which he considers their frontier.
Ateneo de Naga is planning to open a primary school, which will extend the Jesuit education offering in the region from primary school to university level. Scholarships will be available for poor children, and the plan is to have one fifth of the students on scholarships.
Located in the Bicol region in the southernmost tip of Luzon Island, Ateneo de Naga has remained steadfast in its commitment to excellence in education, formation, and development in service of the people in the region. According to the Ateneo at 75 Committee, this commitment and its appropriation of the gift of Ignatian Spirituality enabled Ateneo de Naga to continually transcend tremendous challenges and constraints and respond to the call of God and the frontiers of the times.
A year after it was set up as a Jesuit high school for boys in 1940, classes had to be suspended because of World War II. Classes only resumed in 1946, when Philippine independence was restored. Ateneo de Naga responded to the needs of the Bicol region and the country in rebuilding from the ruins of the war. In 1947, a year after resuming classes, Ateneo de Naga was officially recognized as a standard four-year high school. That same year, it opened a college with 87 male students. In 1953, the Ateneo College became coeducational with the admission of five women.
During the political and socio-economic clashes of the 1970s and 1980s, Ateneo de Naga provided a moral anchor, leading social science survey and research, and crusading for environmental conservation. In the 1990s, consistent with its strong advocacy for Bicol development, Ateneo de Naga led in information technology education even as it strengthened its core programmes in the liberal arts, education, and commerce. In 1991 the Philippine Department of Education, Culture and Sports placed Ateneo de Naga in its list of 18 excellent universities and colleges in the country, and in 1999, Ateneo de Naga was granted university status.
It is a member of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities Asia Pacific (AJCU-AP) and hosted the association’s Service Learning Programme this year. Thirty-three students and seven faculty members from nine Jesuit institutions participated in the initiative, the main highlight of which was building a house for a poor family in the community of Balatasan in Calabanga, Camarines Sur.
For the three year celebration to 2015, the university has adopted as its over-arching theme, “Celebrating 75 Years of Magis, Living the Spirit, and Forging Towards New Frontiers”, which the Ateneo at 75 Committee says expresses the institution’s aspirations and its journey over the years. The themes for each year are inspired by concepts from the Society of Jesus’ General Congregation 35 documents – friendship, fire, and frontier.
“We see communities that are multiple in cultures but united in faith. The narrative that we find ourselves part of is a narrative of companionship: communities that honour identities but also celebrate the shifts and shades of the frontier, the horizon that will be faced always,” said the Ateneo at 75 Committee.
The three themes are Ateneo de Naga: In Victory or Defeat, Ateneo de Naga: Seeking the Fire, Living the Spirit, and Ateneo de Naga: In Faith, Forging towards the Frontiers.
“We move forward with our institutional direction — CorPlan 2020. We move towards our newest frontier – primary education. We move onwards for Bicol, seeking first the Kingdom, for the greater glory of God,” said the Ateneo at 75 Committee.
For more on Ateneo de Naga, go to www.adnu.edu.ph.
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