BAGUIO CITY—With the P100-million restoration works done at the Teachers Camp, the Department of Education (DepEd) wants it to become the center for culture and the arts of the North.

DepEd officials said they are now focusing on giving the 100-year-old Teachers Camp a face-lift to restore major buildings and to recapture the lost ambiance in time for its centennial celebration on April 6, the day some 150 Thomasites first set up camp here in 1908.

“Our vision is to upgrade the facilities of the Camp, make it first class, without altering its character and status as an academic center and a heritage site of the country,” said Education Assistant Secretary Jonathan Malaya during Sunday’s soft launch of the camp’s centennial celebration. “While we have focused on conserving the camp’s physical aspect, it would blend with the DepEd’s thrust of enhancing culture and arts in academe.”

In support of the DepEd’s efforts in upgrading the structures in the camp, President Arroyo issued last year a proclamation declaring 2008 as “Visit Teachers Camp Year” and directed the DepEd to ensure that it will become income-generating and self-sustaining.

President Arroyo is expected to grace the grand launching of the “Visit Teachers Camp Year” campaign on May 10, as well as inaugurate the rehabilitated facilities that are expected to be completed this month.

DepEd’s campaign is expected to draw in tourists into the camp, increase occupancy and dispel the impression that the camp is only for teachers, Malaya said.

Malaya, head of the special task force to oversee conservation and rehabilitation of the camp, said DepEd together with the Heritage Conservation Society is rehabilitating the camp’s 12 dormitories, 47 wood-and-stone American-period cottages, eight conference halls and two mess halls.

All of the structures that are painted in the white-and-green motif of the colonial era are in the camp’s 23-hectare reservation.

Included in the restoration project are landscaping and the construction of a museum, which will serve as tribute to the Thomasites, a group of American volunteers who taught the English language to Filipinos.

During the camp’s centennial soft launching, Malaya and Education Undersecretary Ramon Bacani also unveiled the Teachers Camp centennial car plates.

“We have to upgrade the facilities so that the camp continues to be an excellent venue for teachers’ training and recreation for the next 100 years,” Malaya said.

Military blamed for rights violations

A fact-finding mission commissioned by an international group to investigate alleged human-rights violations in the country has accused military personnel in the abductions of activists accused of being members or sympathizers of the  New People’s Army (NPA).

THE Armed Forces welcomed on Monday a proposal to integrate members of the New People’s Army (NPA) who have already returned to the fold of law into the military and the police.

POLITICS, politics, politics everywhere has messed up a lot of lives of Filipinos and in the “rice crisis” has again reared its ugly head to stave off additional production of the staple that threatens to increase hunger, already rising from previous years.

LEGAZPI CITY—Two senators have declared that they will seek a Senate inquiry into the alleged misuse of the P10-billion Calamity Assistance Rehabilitation Efforts (Care) funds in the Bicol region.

A LEGISLATOR representing the agricultural sector has asked President Arroyo to certify as urgent two bills which that give more teeth to the antismuggling efforts of the government.

Dumangas, Iloilo—The negative impact of climate change is threatening food security in many countries, specifically agriculture-based economies, international organizations like the United Nations and the World Bank said.

BAGUIO CITY—With the P100-million restoration works done at the Teachers Camp, the Department of Education (DepEd) wants it to become the center for culture and the arts of the North.