Area of Focus: Community Economic Development
July 19, 2023
THE RC TIMOG – QC CAREER TALKS
Inspiring Young Women to Become Future Professionals
RC Timog-QC invited resource speakers from amongst its members to talk about their respective professions and success stories with children under the Laura Vicuña Foundation.
Those invited to speak were Atty. Francis Rivera, past district governor; Dr. Kit Victoria, otorhinolaryngologist-head and neck surgeon and Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila-College of Medicine faculty; accountant and DLSU professor Banong Canlas; engineer IPP Ernie Villaroman; engineer PP Pos Vicencio; psychologist Dr. Teng Panganiban; and real estate broker Rtn. Howard Pangalangan with spouse Sam.
The event saw the active participation of the foundation’s young residents who had questions for each speaker, before eventually breaking into sub-groups for more focused discussions that lasted over an hour. In addition to career-specific questions, also emerging from the Q&A session were fervent expressions of the children’s own career aspirations—with some wanting to become physicians themselves, and others considering to venture into real estate someday. Moderating these exchanges was Dr. Teng Panganiban who also contributed his professional expertise by counselling the children. The afternoon ended with the children performing three song and dance numbers such as “A Million Dreams” for the club.
As a token of appreciation for the invitation of Sister Phoebe, the club donated hand mixers, blenders, and various baking ingredients to the foundation, in hopes that getting the kids into baking will help keep them busy and productive in their journey to full recovery.
In battling injustice and abuse, an effective approach is to emphasize the importance of education. It is a good start for these neglected youngsters who weren’t nurtured and taken care of at home. By sowing seeds, they could be redirected from their experiences towards a different path to attain their aspirations. Dreams of becoming a doctor, a lawyer, an engineer, and also a realtor for some, may not be far-fetched after all. It will be a tedious process but in the right direction. What we learned from this exercise was that by simply sharing our stories, we were already giving them HOPE. The smiles and enthusiasm said it all and that it was time to give them a new beginning.