SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA — The Sydney Sillimanians take two historical standpoints of Dear Old Silliman. They do as they anticipate with bated breath their bid for a splash in splendour. In mulling over the parallel viewpoints, they paraphrase Charles Dickens. Fast rewind to year 1889. At that point in time for Dr. Horace B. Silliman, it was the best of times, it was the blurest of times. it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolhardiness, it was his epoch of belief, it was the epoch of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions’ disbelief. From darkness Silliman saw the light; from doubt, hope in establishing a new kind of education for Filipinos. The SU Sydney-siders are taking a peek of the past as it presents A Night of Splendour at the Club Marconi Auditorium, Bossley Park, Sydney on Nov. 5.
They take on the duality of things Seen and Unseen as collage of half-remembrances of their school days forms and reels off in their minds. In this perspective what seems unreal is real as they contemplate on things morphing from the metaphysical to the physical, the concealed made manifest. Word become Flesh–Jesus. The Son of God, the son of man. Emmanuel, the Divine becoming human, is one of us. To take a tale of two SU’s is to embrace two parallel views of the University’s existence–her story and His story. The physical getting the life force and sustenance from the spiritual.
A bird’s eye-view will show the university’s modest beginning. Silliman Institute was established August 28, 1901 in Dumaguete by the PBFM as the first American private school to be founded in the Philippines. The Institute was named after Dr. Horace B. Silliman, a philanthropist, who donated $10,000 to start the school. Starting as an elementary school for boys, it expanded into a college in 1910. In 1938, SI was elevated to Silliman University.
Managed by Americans since its inception, Filipinization started by 1952 with the appointment of a Filipino president. From 1901 up to the present, three Americans and nine Filipinos have served as Silliman Presidents: Dr. David Hibbard (1901-1930), Dr. Roy Brown (1932-1936), Dr. Arthur Carson (1939-1953), Dr. Leopoldo Ruiz (1953-61), Dr. Cicero Calderon (1962-1971), Dr. Quintin Doromal (1973-1982), Justice Venancio Aldecoa (1983-1986), Dr. Pedro Flores (1987-1989), Dr. Angel Alcala (1991-1992), Dr. Melvyn Misajon (1994-1996), Dr. Agustin Pulido (1996-2006) and incumbent president Dr. Ben Malayang III.
Today, Silliman has four schools, two institutes, and ten colleges. It has an enrollment of about 8,900 students from all over the Philippines and 28 foreign countries. Concrete buildings like the Luce Auditorium and SU Library now stand in its 33-hectare main campus in the heart of city overshadowing from the elder generation Sillimanians’ minds the campus’ once-endearing bamboo-made T-rooms. Overall its 62-hectare campus is dotted with 300 acacia trees. Evergreen ever-since despite the sprouting of big concrete buildings. This is Silliman from 1901 to 2011–her infra- and academic growth with the 12 presidents contributing in one way or another during each respective watch and stewardship.
Now under the watch of Pres. Ben Malayang III, SU is engaged in a “friend-raising culture.” For the purpose, the Institutional Advancement Office is created to standardize the assimilation of friends, patrons, and alumni who wish to share their blessings with Silliman. The Institutional Advancement Program seeks to build understanding and lasting relationship with the University “Friends” in supporting its vision, mission, and goals as a leading Christian institution of learning.
For the University’s students nowadays, Pres. Malayang speaks of the Five C’s of Learning. They are the learning opportunities in the classroom, courts, culture, communities, and church. The President proclaims that by the time a student graduates from Silliman, all 5 C’s have already become an integral part of his/her being in producing a well-rounded person of competence, character, and faith.
On hindsight, we keep faith in an eye-in-the-sky viewpoint. Dr. Arthur Carson, the third SU President, wrote how one man’s resolve paved the way for the establishment of Silliman. A year after Admiral George Dewey’s naval victory in 1898 over the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay, Dr. Silliman showed up before the PBFM with the conviction that the Filipinos would need a new kind of education. The Board then was still starting to consider a mission in the Philippines and explained the situation to the visitor. Dr. Silliman persisted driven but his desire to educate the people which he had never seen nor met in his lifetime by establishing an industrial school in the Philippines.
Dr. David Hibbard and his wife Laura undertook the mission to establish the school. Originally, three sites were considered. They were in Cebu, Zamboanga, and Iloilo. While in Cebu, Dr. Hibbard took a side trip to Dumaguete. About to disembark from the ship, the missionary couple beheld the beauty of Dumaguete by the sea in the early morning glory. Hibbard’s perception of Dumaguete as a place of health and beauty then clinched the decision to establish Silliman in the City of Gentle People. The first president Dr. David S. Hibbard described for posterity the first day of class: There were fifteen boys that first morning. The equipment consisted of two desks about ten feet long, two tables and two chairs a few McGuffey’s Readers, a few geographies, arithmetics and ninth-grade grammars. I was the President; Mrs. Hibbard, the faculty.
SU is founded on the byword via, veritas, vita. In a 110-year journey, all her students and graduates have passed through SU’s gates of knowledge, opportunity, and service. Their competence, conduct and character are forged in the ways of the Galilean–God who has walked with us. Jesus before his resurrection has declared I am the way the truth and the life. The hope and assurance of this byword has served Sillimanians in the dark days of the university. Japanese Occupation in World War II, Martial Law which surrounded her campus with barb wires, and Filipinization which paved the drying up of mission support.
Sillimanians showed their resilience when the Japanese turned the main campus into a war garrison by establishing a jungle university in the mountains of Malabo, Valencia. They converted the barb wires into beautiful fences. As to the declining mission support Dr. Paul Lauby, a true Sillimanian, showed the way in an article for the United Board Newsletter entitled Looking for Mr. Moneyman. Dr. Lauby demonstrated the positive impact on SU’s failing financial health of a globally united SU Alumni. He presented to the North American Sillimanians that with each of them just giving $100 dollars the aggregate sum would improve SU’s financial picture dramatically.
SU is you. Sillimanian roaming o’er near and far. SU the way you were and the way you are. Silliman–yesterday, now, and forever. SU xoxo kaayo.
