Education for All

By Johanne Margarette R. Macob

I COULDN’T count the ways how education has helped me, as well as my family, in improving our lifestyle and economic status.

I don’t come from a well-off family and every step towards achieving our diplomas had been a difficult challenge for us, seven siblings. My father was a teacher and my mom is a house wife who is always looking out for opportunities to help out in the family’s financial needs. I remember my older siblings had to do part-time work as well. We, literally, had to find ways to save on tuition mainly through academic excellence or avail of financial grants from various scholarship programs.

When my father died in 2004, there were still three of us who had not finished college. I was just about to pursue high school that time. The good thing was, my four sibs have already found respective employments with the degrees they earned and were able to help us, the younger ones. Still, it was the various scholarship programs that helped us, a lot. We were either academic scholars or state scholars.

Thus, I am, and will always be, thankful to scholarship programs. Scholarships, more than helping us get our academic degrees, have instilled deeply in us the value of education. We learned the value of discipline. Back then, we were not simply studying, we were studying well. We had to, to maintain our scholarships. And I am grateful it worked that way. We all are in the family.

Last February 18-20, Governor Amado Espino Jr. led the distribution of the P10,000-financial grant each to the 1,240 provincial scholars enrolled at the Pangasinan State University (PSU). Apart from that, there are other scholarship programs being financed by the provincial government like the Academic Scholarship Program, the Pangasinan Cultural Scholarship, and the Joint Congressional and Provincial Scholarship Program with 1st District Rep.. Jesus Celeste. Also, oftentimes, each university also provides scholarships to its academic achievers.

The point is, there are a lot of options on how we can pursue our dreams through education. One simply must be determined enough to earn them. Never give up. Let us always remember that education is still the best way to a better, or yes, to the best in life.

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