OPEN LETTER TO REV. DR. BRIAN SHAH
August 6, 2013
Rev.
Dr. Brian Shah
President,
Saviour’s Christian Academy
D.
Samonte, Laoag City, Philippines
Dear
Rev. Dr. Shah,
In
the spirit of fairness, we are writing this open letter to you, and we have it
made available to the public so that you can give a public accounting of what
you did to three of your students: Kleinee Bautista, Carl Andrew Abadilla, and
Samuel Respicio.
You
have done damage to the students, and you have done damage to the Ilokano language.
You
have done damage to the Ilokano communities all over the Philippines, and you
have done damage to the Ilokano communities in the diaspora to which we the
undersigned belong.
By your
action, Reverend Doctor Brian Shah, you have demeaned our sense of self, and
have veritably deprived us of the home of our souls, our Ilokano language.
We
would like you now to say in plain English what exactly you want to do with the
next Ilokano students in your school—the very school that you say “my school”—when
you hear them speak Ilokano.
Your
act of ‘advising’ these students to look for another school is expulsion. Let
us not go around the bush.
We
are writing this open letter as educators and academics in Hawaii, and as
advocates of cultural pluralism, linguistic justice, diversity, and liberatory
education—principles we believe are dear to you as both educator and person of
the cloth.
We
are also writing this open letter as former community members of Laoag City.
This city raised us during the time when our Ilokano language was valued by
educators like you, and when students were not expelled when ‘caught’ speaking
in the Ilokano of their homes and communities—in the Ilokano of their people
and their ancestors.
While
we are now based in Hawaii, we are working closely with our co-advocates in the
pursuit of these principles we enumerated not only for ourselves as Ilokanos
but for all our peoples in the Philippines.
Lately, we held the 7th Nakem International Conference in San
Fernando City, La Union to start a national, and hopefully, an international,
conversation on the mother tongue-based multicultural education now being
implemented in the Philippines. After almost three generations of having been
virtually deprived of our own Ilokano language in education and in other areas
of our public life, we thought that the MTB-MLE will show us the way to
becoming ourselves again, even as we are committed to building communities
within and outside our localities.
To
give context to this open letter, please allow us to quote from the mission
statement of your school: “(T)o provide our students with a balanced and
well-rounded education, develop them to their full potential, and nurture them
into good citizens, mindful of their responsibilities to family, society, and
country.”
We
list here several key questions that we would like you to answer in an open letter
as well. As educator and pastor, it is now your duty to give an accounting of
what happened to these three students you expelled because they spoke Ilokano.
First, when administrators and school
owners like you demand “respect for your school” from students by making them
speak English as soon as they get into your campus, will real and honest
communication happen? When told to speak English all the time, will students
like Kleinee, Carl Andrew, and Samuel—students in the threshold of
adolescence—ever have a “balanced and well-rounded education” as you claim in
your mission statement?
Second, when you deprive students of
their right to express their innermost—their most intimate—thoughts in the
language of their home and community, will they ever “develop (their) full
potential” as you claim in that same mission statement? Isn’t it that an
important aspect of human development is the affirmation and validation of what
one is—a validation and affirmation of his being and becoming—and that the
school is one of the means through which that act of affirmation and validation
happens? In your denial of the Ilokanoness of these students, do you think that
you will be able to develop them as full human beings?
Third, you talk about “(nurturing the)
students into good citizens, mindful of their responsibilities to family,
society, and country.” Do you think that by depriving these students of their
Ilokano language, they will become good citizens, citizens who are sensitive to
the diversity of their own community and their own country, and citizens who
will be able to give back to their own Ilokano people and to the peoples of
their own country?
We
have come to know of this especially difficult incident, made more difficult by
the fact that today, the Philippine educational system has embarked on
something that is right and fair and democratic, the education of our young
through their mother tongue. Your action is the exact opposite of this novel definition
of Philippine basic education. Now, you must account.
Finally,
we would like to ask: On what right can you claim that you “own” the school? We
have laws in the Philippines that define ownership of anything by foreigners,
and we would like to ask on what ground you say you “own” Saviour’s Christian
Academy?
As
Ilokanos from the diaspora but Ilokanos who trace their roots in Laoag City, we
believe we have the right to demand for answers to these questions we have
raised in this open letter.
Now
we invoke the justice of your God—the “Saviour” you refer to—for you to come clean with
the Ilokano people.
Very
truly yours in the faith,
Sgd. Aurelio Solver Agcaoili, PhD Sgd. Raymund
Llanes Liongson, PhD
Nakem Conferences International & Nakem Conferences International &
University of Hawaii-Manoa University of
Hawaii-Leeward CC
Honolulu, HI,
USA Pearl City, HI, USA
No comments:
Post a Comment