Technology Must Be Crazy

One afternoon in February 1998, I took the Bicol University College Admission Test. While lazily shading circles for answers, I was wishing that there were more lighted florescent bulbs at the back of the old Bicol University Little Amphitheater where I was seated. I was also saying to myself with conviction that, “I do not want to study at Bicol University”. I flunked the exam without regret.

I passed the entrance examination at San Beda College. One of the things I enjoyed at San Beda College are the classrooms that were adequately lighted with airconditioning. LCD Projectors were available in every classroom which was kept in a miniature cabinet. Every time we have reporting, we have to request for a key from the Instructional Media Center even in short notice. System units, laptops, video cameras, vcd’s, video editing services, cassette and video tapes were also available.

We also spend five pesos per transparencies at a nearby photocopy center. To limit the expenses, we got used to the habit of including only key words and phrases. One computer is to one student is the rule in the computer laboratory. Aside from our computer teacher, we have a computer laboratory assistant to assist us in case of computer malfunction. We also have six hours of Internet access every semester at the Internet Laboratory.

Fourteen years after, I came back at Bicol University as a part-time professorial lecturer at the College of Business, Economics and Management and as a continuing education student at the College of Education.

With my one semester experience as an educator, I enjoyed my classroom which is known as Information Communications Technology Laboratory. It has airconditioning, thirty computers, LCD Projector and stereo.

But in the middle of the semester, some computers were not anymore usable. Computers became unusable one by one every day. Only twenty four computers survived. Some were under maintenance and the rest were industrial wastes. Even our LCD projector broke down in the middle of February. Refusing to go through the tedious process of reserving and borrowing LCD projector at the Departmental Office, I used Manila Papers as visual aids.

Technology had gone wild. When technology fails, I cannot help myself but smile and laugh. Not a smirk. Not an evil laugh. But a laugh similar to Piolo Pascual when he was interviewed about his break up with Kaycee Concepcion and a giggle akin to talk show host Anderson Cooper. Smiling and laughing reminds me that technology and I can go completely crazy. But I have to make sure I still to do the right job because the best technology is the teacher.

My laughter and smile might harden with the cynicism of the years or turn down at corners through the weight of unanticipated technological tragedies and difficult situations of life. For now, I am glad that I became a teacher that allows me to achieve not just my dream but other dreams as well. As one teacher wrote:

           

 “…as a Teacher, we hope to touch more than one life. In some way, we hope to touch every student, maybe not everyone profoundly, but we hope that we’ll have touch each student by letting him or her know that we care…this is to have succeded”