The School of Environment Science and Management (SESAM)- University of the Philippines Los Banos has been recognized as a Center of Excellence (COE) in environmental science by the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) through their Memorandum Order (CMO) no. 38, together with other 47 academic disciplines that was released last December 23, 2015.
SESAM is included in the new list of institutions of COEs and CODs (budding candidates for COEs in the future) from different fields that were covered by the CMO: Agriculture Education, Business and Management, Criminology, as well as Engineering Education, Health Professions Education, Humanities, Information Technology Education, Science and Mathematics, Social Sciences, and Communication.
Being a COE, SESAM is regarded as an institution “which continuously demonstrate excellent performance in the areas of instruction, research and publication, extension and linkages and institutional qualifications.” The selection of the departments to be distinguished in the list of COEs and CODs only happens every two years, meaning this status will be effective from January 1, 2016 up until December 31, 2018.
Having signed the said CMO herself, CHED chairman Patricia Licuanan said, “The new COEs and CODs will be given research funds from project proposals geared toward the development or improvement of the programs, particularly cutting-edge technology in different disciplines,” referring to the Section 8 (f) of RA 7722, otherwise known as the Higher Education Act of 1994, wherein it aspires for the sustainability/development of the excellence of higher education institutions (HEIs) through government support.
Dr. Deceibel F. Eslava, Dean of SESAM urged the faculty and REPS of SESAM to have more outputs in publication, research and graduates, as CHED will review the COE status of the school after three years.
The other institutions that were also rewarded by this designation in UPLB are the College of Agriculture (CA), College of Veterinary Medicine (CVM), Institute of Computer Science (ICS), the Institute of Statistics (IS), and College of Development Communication (CDC). (Matthew Delminguez and Thaddeus Lawas)
