Galleries

Multiple people have attempted to describe what makes a story development-oriented. From foreign scholars to homegrown geniuses such as our very own Nora Quebral, their inputs have helped form the very foundation of our course. Here, Juan Jamias gives his own ideas.

Development Communicators do not just publish communication materials just for the sake of publishing. These communicators makes an effort to make their work development-oriented and targets specific types of audience.

Let us see how an alumnus of UPLB-CDC sees a topic to be development-oriented.

John Derrick is not just an alumnus of CDC but a former CSC Chairman of CDC and is currently working as an instructor in LPU-Cavite.

Sylvia Plath, Emily Dickinson, and Virginia Woolf are just some of the female personalities that our male writer looks up to. His interest in feminist poetry led to his sudden strike of awareness that life, in this patriarchal society, is difficult for women. He understood how privileged he is as a male-born Filipino citizen; he recognized that several accounts of inequality is in front of him daily; and he realized that he must start doing something as early as today. Apparently, his once narrow view of the society widened during his Senior High School days when he took up the Humanities and Social Sciences strand.

Men cannot be feminists – is the biggest misconception that he wants to quash. One of his actions in this personal advocacy is by finishing his grounded-theory qualitative paper titled Gender Neutrality as Linguistic Prescription in 21^st Century Western Pop Music. His paper explained the socio-linguistic phenomenon involved in gender politics where women are characterized in sexist ways by several artists in the music industry, which is a very influential platform. He strongly believes that development starts when both women and men are respected in literature, language, and mainstream media. Campus Journalism has also been his haven of expression as he has written articles about gender inclusive education, and the necessity of gender equality in the country’s progress. All of these are with the hopes of utilizing this harmless and non-violent avenue to ignite gender-inclusive movements in his school.

Our writer was just nine-years-old when he started as a Sports Writer in their school publication. After exploring the action-packed world of balitang pampalakasan, he jumped into photojournalism and learned to capture the stories that are worth-telling. From writing and photography, he discovered his desire to speak the truth which expounds why he geared towards becoming the News Anchor of their school’s Radio Broadcasting team.

Now seventeen, he is currently a Development Communication major at the university named after the country. This harnessed his utak, knowing the technicalities in mass media writing, and puso, understanding the need to address the disparity in socio-economic experiences of 108 million Filipinos. As an aspiring lawyer, he believes that the pen is mighty enough to make people realize that women’s rights are human rights.

Nobody said that college life is easy but nobody said this would be so hard.

First month here in university is already mixed emotions. At first, I felt excited to be an Iska because my dream finally turned into reality. But my excitedness didn’t maintain its high level and my first month stay here in university already gave me many lessons. Despite the mixed emotions and challenging situations I encountered, thankfully, I survived a month here in University of the Philippines. And so, here are my realizations/ lessons learned in my first month in UPLB:

Preparedness is a must

One must come prepared at all times ‘cause you’ll never know
what might happen. That is the most important thing I always bear in mind, to become ready all the time. Here in University of the Philippines, no one can never know who will survive in the future happenings unless you’ll face future preparedly and armed. One example here is, bringing your umbrella all the time, because I knew that the university has its own weather system, therefore the weather is really unpredictable. 

Know your priorities

Focus on what’s most important, and learn to prioritize the
things you need to accomplish immediately. Such as in requirements, you should weigh the things in your to-do list and balance the time you’ll spend in requirements. If you focus on your priorities then it can help you to avoid cramming.

Accept your failures

Not all the time, I can be best among the rest. Here in University of the Philippines, I learned to accept my weaknesses and failures because if I let depression take control over me, then I’ll suffer even more. Instead, use my failures as a motivation to do more and be the best version of
myself. Because no one can ever help me but only myself. 

Health comes first

Prioritize first your health because you can’t accomplish
your work if you’re unhealthy or have any diseases. It is a must to maintain your strength from the beginning until the end because if you became weak, it would be more difficult to do your requirements. So always keep in mind, health over acads.

Learn to enjoy

Amidst of workloads, you must don’t forget to enjoy. Even if
I feel depressed some time, I should still give myself time to rest and enjoy my college life. It’s okay to take a break from acads in order to have a fresh start. Don’t push yourself too much on acads.

Honor and excellence

This is the tagline of University of the Philippines. In everything you do, you must do it with Honor and Excellence. For us ‘Iskolar ng Bayan’, must accomplish our duties for the benefit of people. Because being an ISKA is a privilege, so, we must do our best to fulfill our responsibilities to our nation
for us to be rightfully called Iskolar ng Bayan.

The path that I’m taking now might be blurry and dark, but when the right time comes, all of this would be worth it in the end. It just needs patience and virtue to reach the finish line and in order to wear a sablay. And I’m still fighting to reach the end even if it’s just a month after I began this fight.

According to the World Bank, “Awareness of the different purposes and functions of various types of communication is the first step toward a better understanding of the field of development communication and an effective way to enhance necessary quality standards.” A development communicator in training must be aware of the latest development-oriented topics. As we become a development communicator, we open our eyes to the recent developmental issues happening in our world. Through communication, we address these issues to achieve development.

Development-oriented topics are those which concern a community’s development. Almost every topic can be development-oriented. In one way or another, we can found a way for these topics to become development-oriented. But there are certain guidelines to know which topic is development-oriented.

Development-oriented topics are those which is about the progress of the community/society in achieving development. Communities might encounter difficulties in the process of becoming a well-developed community, these struggles we can call development-oriented topics. For example, poverty is a development-oriented topic because it hinders a community to achieve development.

In order to be development-oriented, a topic must be relatable for those who will read it. These topics are the recent events happening to a community.  A development-oriented topic when made to a news or an article must be useful to help the people be aware of the happenings around them. A development communicator must be a messenger of development-oriented topics, but it must be effective and informative.

If it’s not all facts, then it is not a development-oriented topic. A development communicator makes sure that all information is factual because we aim to be effective and informative. Wrong information can cause big troubles that’s why we must make sure that we are credible.

Reference: World Bank Development Communication Sourcebook http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTDEVCOMMENG/Resources/DevelopmentCommSourcebook.pdf

As I step in my college building, I began to ponder, what is development? This simple word has yet to be defined in a more profound way. Being human, means being able to live in a life where struggles are lessen, however not all are the same for every people, hence why I think, that development is adhere to a change, which could be the ultimate goal of development. As I progress into this journey of being a development communication student, and as I learn more and somewhat definite answer as to what development communication is, it should have at least three characteristic to determine if it really is developmental.

1. Development should have a mindset for change. 

Development cannot be a ‘development’ when in fact the meaning of development is to grow, mature, and/or advance into a type of change. Development should have a change however, it needs not to be an immediate type of change, but somewhat a type of change that is or can be considered as beneficial to all people of the nation. In addition, it does not necessarily need to be a rapid change, but, what matters is the change that benefit the people, even when it takes a slower approach. 

2. Development should have a certain goal. 

Development should have an aim or a goal, aim to do what is necessary for the people to survive, and aim to make the people, environment, and the nation to feel that they are a part of the world we are living in today. How can we have a developmental mindset if we do not even have a goal? Having a goal to persevere us to do something that can greatly change and enhance our lives and the lives of the future generation. 

  3. Development should consider the audience. 

Development should tackle a community’s specific need or problem so that the solution/s are anchored to those problems. The developmental approach should cater to the audience, and that the audience, could easily understand, and develop or applied without much of a hassle. Development should be able to, ideally, solve the problems that the community or nation is facing, since development, in a larger scale, is not time-bounded, and that it should have been seen, slowly and efficiently, and not hastily. 

In the Philippines, which is said to be a third world country, therefore the Philippines is considered a developing country. Hence, development oriented topics are needed for the Filipinos who are in need of a change, not only in terms of physical aspects, but especially, a change in life.  And being a development communication student, it is clear that the topic of development, in terms of its characteristics, is goal-driven and that its result should not be hindered to a person, but rather, to the community or the nation.