INTERVIEW WITH LAOAG CITY SCHOOLS SUPERINTENDENT RE 3 EXPELLED STUDENTS

     I met her for the first time in a writers' symposium at the Mariano Marcos State University in Laoag.  She impressed me as a no-nonsense individual who did her job well as an educator and official of the Department of Education.

   

Ilocos Norte Provincial Capitol in Laoag City

     On August 14, 2013, I met City Schools Superintendent Araceli Pastor at her office across Camp Juan in the poblacion. I was delivering a letter of the chairs of the Hawaii-based International Committee in support of Abadilla, Bautista and Respicio. The three students who were expelled from their school  when they spoke in Ilokano inside the school campus. 

     We had a long talk on the issue and the August 8 closed door meeting at her office with the parents and other relatives of two of the students, Carl Andrew Abadilla and Kleinee Bautista; Atty. Jaime Agtang, SCA's lawyer; and Rev. Dr. Brian Shah, president of Savior's Christian Academy. The dialogue, Dr. Pastor said, ended with the parties concerned hugging each other.  They agreed not to discuss the issue in public, not to say anything to media.

     In the afternoon of the same day, Atty. Agtang announced in GMA's Balitang Ilokano that the issue has been resolved and the expelled students could go back to SCA.

     The lawyer's announcement prompted Dr. Aurelio Solver Agcaoili of the University of Hawaii at Manoa and Dr. Raymund Ll. Liongson of the Community College of Leeward, chairs of the International Committee chairs to write Dr. Pastor, Rep Rodolfo C. Farinas, SP member Ria Farinas and Laoag City Councilor Franklin Dante Respicio.

     Dr. Pastor was not initiating an investigation on the expulsion of the students because, she said, there was no complaint filed before her office.