Rightfully said.   We must have hope

and faith in our countrymen and our

country so we can now move on....


When the smoke cleared and the bodies were counted,

as Mendoza 's story slowly is spread to a visibly shaken

nation, I am shattered by the vicious remarks brought

to my doorstep courtesy of Facebook. I see words like

"Only in the Philippines " and "nakakahiya tayo."  Here

 are my countrymen, talking about themselves as though

everything that had been done wrong at the Quirino
Grandstand was a national trait, as though stupidity

were possible only here and the only ones capable of

 it are Filipinos. And then, I remember with sadness that

it is also my own countrymen, who, when seeing a

beautiful place in the Republic say with awe, "Ang

ganda dito, parang wala tayo sa Pilipinas!"

Of course P/Insp. R. Mendoza committed a criminal act.

Of course the police officers and media persons and

networks could have handled matters in a more sensitive

 and timely manner. But it also especially hurts when

 these mistakes are ascribed as national traits. Only in

the Philippines daw. And only Filipinos could screw up

 this badly.

The vultures can't resist jeering and insulting. Stupid

media. Stupid cops. Stupid Mendoza . Stupid by-standers.

The Filipino nation is stupid.

Excuse me?

Our ancestors believed in the concept of an afterlife when

 many other peoples of the world were still figuring out how

 to make stone tools. Our forebears crossed the Pacific years

before the Vikings crossed the Atlantic . They cultivated rice

 when many others were still living in caves. They had the

first revolution in  Asia that united no less than three disparate

linguistic groups through a leader named Diego Silang whose

wife became his successor. This nation produced women

leaders and warriors when much of Europe  still considered

the female gender as mere chattel. My country abolished

slavery two hundred years ahead of the so called New World .

My country, whose history and treasures remain mysteries to

 its own children, cannot and should not be defined by the

mistakes of yesterday's events

And we will not be defined by this tragedy. But we must

learn from it. And the first lesson should and ought to be

not to add any more hurt to a nation prostate with grief.

So much blood ignites so much passion. But we can either

flagellate ourselves until there is nothing left of our self

esteem. Or we can turn this into an impetus for change.

 Real change.

So, I will mourn today. I will grieve for all the victims, yes,

 Mendoza  included. I will mourn for all the ignorance that

 makes an embarrassing display of itself in times of crisis.

I will mourn for the good men and women of the PNP who

 feel the brunt of the national outrage, but who will go to

work tomorrow and still go after the bad guys, still keep

us safe. I will mourn for media persons who must live with

 the effects of their live broadcasts.

But after that, I will choose hope and faith in my countrymen.

exam,Ateneo de Naga University graduate Rayan Oliva

brings pridenot only to his school but to the Filipino

male population aswell as he is the first male to top the

exam in three years.

Oliva broke a three-year trend of female nursing graduates

topping all six nursing licensure exams given by the

Professional Regulation Commission from June 2007 to

November 2009, according to data culled by GMANews.TV.

The last time the nursing board exams had a male graduate

as a topnotcher was in December 2006, when Jayben

Matamis of the Unciano Colleges and Medical Center in

Antipolo City topped the 19,712 passers.

Since then, the topnotchers have been female nursing

graduates, the latest being Clarie Bontol of the Iligan

Medical Center College Inc. in Lanao del Norte, who

headed the list of 37,527 passers of the November

2009 nursing board exam.

Oliva, who hails from Camarines Sur in Bicol Region,

however continues the trend of provincial nursing

graduates ranking first in the licensure exams.

Since November 2008, provincial exam takers have been

leading the list of passers.

At that time, Jovie Ann Decoyna, a farm girl from the

Baguio Central University, was announced as the topnotcher

in the nursing board examination.

Top-performing schools

Although the topnotchers in the past four nursing board

exams all came from the provinces, the list of top-performing

schools for this year showed a mix of colleges and universities

both from urban and rural areas.

The Chinese General Hospital College of Nursing and Liberal Arts

in Manila was named the top-performing school with 100 or more

examinees this year, with a passing rate of 99.60 percent. It was

followed by the West Visayas State University in Iloilo, with a

99.36 percent passing rate.

Three universities—Saint Paul University in Iloilo, University of the

Philippines-Manila and the Philippine Christian University-Manila—

were meanwhile named as top-performing schools with 30

to 99 examinees.The three schools posted a 100-percent passing

rate.

Two of the top-performing schools this year—the West Visayas

State University and Saint Paul University, both in Iloilo—also

made it to the list of schools with 100-percent passing rate during

the November 2009 nursing board exam.

Slightly higher passing rate

The overall passing rate for this year’s nursing licensure exams,

meanwhile, slightly recovered from the figures last year, when

slightly less than 40 percent of the exam takers managed to

pass the exam.

A total of 37,679 out of the 91,008 exam takers, or

41.4 percent, passed the nursing exam given last month by

the PRC Board of Nursing. This figure is a slight improvement

from last year’s 39.7 percent passing rate.

The number of exam takers this year also slightly declined

compared to the November 2009 figures, when 94,462

graduates took the exam—the highest in history.

The high number of exam takers supposedly reflects the

popularity of nursing as a field of study due to the promise

of a well-paying job abroad.

The popularity of nursing as a field of study has also prompted

the mushrooming of sub-par nursing schools around the country,

despite a government ban on opening of new nursing schools

implemented six years ago. –VVP, GMANews.TV