Tagumpay-Castillo
Eighteen of 24 UPAA awardees are UPD alumni.
National scientist Gelia Tagumpay-Castillo and Justice Ameurfina Melencio-Herrera of the Supreme Court received the highest awards at the UP Alumni Association’s General Homecoming and Reunion on June 23 at the Ang Bahay ng Alumni.
Tagumpay-Castillo
Melencio-Herrera
Both bestowed the Most Distinguished Alumna, Tagumpay-Castillo was recognized for her work in promoting social science and its use in addressing the problems of rural society while Melencio-Herrera was honored for her pioneering works in Bar reform in the country.
Tagumpay-Castillo’s body of work was cited as having contributed “to the building of a social science for research and development.” Her students, hailing from different parts of the world, currently occupy important positions and are themselves contributors toward agriculture and rural development in their areas of work.
Melencio-Herrera is the second woman to be appointed to the Supreme Court. During her Chancellorship, she steered the Philippine Judicial Academy to initiate Court-Annex Mediation and Judicial Dispute Resolution (JDR) to decongest court dockets.
Tagumpay-Castillo earned a BA Psychology, magna cum laude, in 1953 while Melencio-Herrera earned her Ll. B. in 1947, graduating cum laude and Law Class valedictorian.
Meanwhile, Dr. Jaime Aristotle B. Alip of UP Los Baños (UPLB) was honored with the Most Distinguished Alumnus. Alip’s service to the poor earned him the distinction from UPAA.
Alip is the founder of the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development (CARD) Mutually Reinforcing Institutions (MRI), the first non-government organization to transform into a bank, is a microfinance institution that provides micro insurance services to its clients.
CARD MRI has provided assistance to its 1.4 clients via its financial and non-financial services. To date, CARD MRI has a total outstanding loan of P1.1 billion.
Alip earned his BS Agricultural Economics in 1972 and his MS Agricultural Marketing in 1983 from UPLB.
Of the 24 alumni recognized for their outstanding achievements in their respective fields by the UPAA, 18, including Tagumpay-Castillo and Melencio-Herrera are from UPD. The other awardees were: Prof. Rubén F. Balane, Tomás Cadorna Banguis, Prof. Alejandro J. Casambre, Justice Florentino P. Feliciano, Marikina Mayor Ma. Lourdes Carlos-Fernando, Mikaela Irene D. Fudolig, Dr. Ester Albano García, Lenore Raquel Santos-Lim, Dr. Aura Castillo-Matias, Dr. Virginia Alvarez-Miralao, Rosa Samson-Pacubas, Yolanda Bello Pajaro, Maryo J.
delos Reyes, Prof. Belen O. Rillo, Rep. Loretta Ann Pargas-Rosales and Prof. Leticia H. Tison.
Feliciano and García received the Lifetime Distinguished Achievement Award.
Ten of the 14 recipients of the Outstanding Professional Awards are from UPD. They are: Tison (Arts and Letters), Banguis (Business Administration/Advertising),Bello-Pajaro (Business Administration), De los Reyes (Communication/Film and Audio Visual), Castillo-Matias (Engineering and Technology), Raquel Santos-Lim (Fine Arts), Rillo (Home Economics/Food Science and Technology), Balane (Law), Carlos-Fernando (Public Administration) and Alvarez-Miralao (Social Sciences).
Samson-Pacubas received the Community Service Award (Luzon), as Rosales and Casambre were both honored with this year’s UPAA Presidential Award. Fudolig was one of two Outstanding 2007 Graduates..