With full resolve to advance Ilocano language and culture, the Graduate School (GS) has started offering the program Master of Arts in Education (MAEd) major in Ilocano Language Studies.

This curriculum, according to GS Dean Joselito L. Lolinco, is an answer to the growing demand of elementary school teachers to learn the correct usage of the Ilocano language which they need to implement the Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE) program.

Dr. Lolinco said the program is meant to train and equip school teachers and cultural workers from the Ilocano speaking region in the country with the skills needed to pursue the ends of liberation education via the MTB-MLE.

The University invited Dr. Aurelio S. Agcaoili, coordinator of the Ilocano Language, Literature, and Culture Program of the University of Hawaii, as affiliate faculty member to teach fundamental competencies to GS professors who will be directly involved in the program. Dr. Agcaoili held an intensive two-week course with around 20 pioneer enrolees.

Dr. Lolinco said that after putting together the program’s curricular design, Dr. Agcaoili’s personal engagement in the launching of the program will surely enable the students to imbibe the vision of the program and become effective educators in the Ilocano language. “An elevated linguistic-cultural literacy among our people is the ultimate end,” the dean mused.