Sharing the Brain Juice

Dr. Oponda is a man with a plan. The chair of the Math, Physics, and Computer Science Department of UP Mindanao, he hatched a plan to link with industry denizens to bridge the students' knowledge gap between what theories they learned in school and how different and fast-paced it really is in the real world. This, he said, would be a far better way for the university's graduates to cope with new and oft-innovated trends of the techno trade.

Meanwhile, in one of his "Eureka!" moments while doing something else entirely, John comes up with a dream to "Train the Trainers" -- an initiative to train the educators so they, in turn, could cascade the knowledge down to their students. It would be sort of a "giving back to the community" effort where Ingenuity would train select educators from different schools (free of charge) to update their knowledge base of the ever-changing industry.

By some happy twist of fate, the two met, mixed the brew, and have now amalgamated their ideas into one coherent and doable project: the UP Mindanao Training chuchubells (sorry, it doesn't really have an official moniker).

Last Saturday, September 8, 2012, was the first session and we are very happy to report that it was a smashing success! Save for a few, last-minute additional students who weren't able to bring their machines, and other no-shows, the first day, handled by Aljohn and Koon, went smoothly.

A total of 18 graduating students of Computer Science from UP Mindanao came to the office for the training.

This may have started small, but we are sure that with the combined efforts of all parties involved, this will be such a success, it'll be replicated across the industry, not only here in Davao City, but the whole Philippines!

Onward and more power!