Life should be better 

After K+12 tourism 

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, September 14 (PIA)—Generously confident, that is how students of the country’s first K+12 tourism senior high school feel about landing a job at least, after graduation this April. 

And they are just in Grade 12. 

Wilma Grace Galin, 16 years old of Looc Panglao confides, she has got the best training that students can get in housekeeping with three world class hotel rooms, a front desk and even a cooking station provided by the private sector in partnership with the government in her school. 

Bohol local government in coordination with the DEPED put up a multi-million mini-hotel within the school compound, as teachers crafting the modules convinced local leaders that a real hotel where students can apply practical housekeeping skills would immensely help. 

According to Vera Villocido Gesite, project manager of the Asia Foundation’s Coalition for Change in Education assisting the pioneering project, Lourdes National High School (LNHS) came out as the first fully equipped training facility for senior high school. 

The mini-hotel has three bed rooms each voluntarily embellished by star-rated tourism establishments here: Mithi Resort and Spa, Bohol Beach Club and South Palms Resort. 

Amorita Hotel also put up the hotel front desk, manned by students. 

“It helps a lot when you have proper facilities,” Galin said, adding that all they need is to get past the National Certification for housekeeping, to be certified as employable. 

Finishing junior high school here, Galin, a housekeeping senior high school, along with about 500 graduating students found that the senior high school here is way more focused on the major services and enhances more on the skills and abilities as front-liners in the tourism industry with practical demonstration and application. 

“In junior high school, what we got was a general orientation of the tasks, and interpersonal relations, knowing that the job in the future entails facing customers and relating with them,” Galin, with neatly tied hair and a hint of excitement, bared. 

She should know, her brother Louie Jay Galin who was among the MNHS tourism pioneering graduates now sits as the front office manager in a resort in Panglao. 

“Whether I go to college or not, I can still get into the industry related to my training, especially now that Panglao Airport is opening up more windows of opportunity,” she pressed, when asked what if she can’t go to college. 

Meanwhile, Vic Anthony Tacder, 19 years old of Tangnan, after completing the general orientation on tourism, believes after the national certification in February, landing a job is not that tough with the right skills they have. 

“Training here is upgraded and it is more on experience and application, that that makes you capable, and you won’t be left in the back as you have the facility,” he started off. 

A resident of Tangnan, Tacder is a student of bread and pastry, and bakes in a double decker oven given by the Department of Science and technology. 

When bread and pastry is keen with the rapidly evolving technologies which have been the problems similarly experienced by automotive graduates, Tacder said he will find all ways, experiment if it can be done to get acquainted with the technology. 

“For me, at least I have the basics [in baking] and things could not be as complicated as that,” he shared. 

As to his readiness to get to a job as soon as he gets the NC II to be assessed by the country’s technical skills authority, he said “eight of ten.” 

Readiness wise, he shared intoned that he has been really been so attentive, even if he thinks he can also proceed 

“This year, the focus is more on the application of housekeeping,” relayed 29 year-old teacher Judie C. Sarabia, citing the availability of real hotel rooms and a front desk at the mini hotel and embellished by resort owners in the resort island of Panglao. 

Bespectacled and young, Sarabia who teaches here after completing Bachelor of Science in Hotel and Restaurant Management at the Holy Name University said the DepED picked a nice curriculum that integrates the learnings. 

In her second year as a teacher, Sarabia, who had some four years of experience in from office operations in Cebu, said while the professional teachers put up the theories, the hospitality graduates like her add the practical side of the service. 

We are grateful to have a government that sees to it that we can enhance our skills to be successful, Galin said. 

For Tacder, the K12 here worked because the government and the private sector worked to bring about the best. 

Tacder and Galin, along the 500 graduates would soon be leaving the gates of LNHS, some would be off to college, go get absorbed in their on-the-job-training partner resorts, or maybe start to put up their own small businesses, as the tourism senior high school administrators intend it to be. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol) 

Lourdes High School tourism senior high school students Vic Anthony Tacder and Wilma Grace Galin, with teacher Judie C. Sarabia share their insights on the pioneering senior high school in Panglao. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)