An elementary school that is a pilot site of the School and Home Gardens program led by the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (Searca) won an international award for its chievements in education and sustainable development (ESD).
Labuin Elementary School in Pila, Laguna, won the third prize in the 2017 Seameo-Japan ESD Award conferred by the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization (Seameo)-Japan Ministry of Education, Culture, Science and Technology in cooperation with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization Asia-Pacific Regional Bureau of Education.
With the theme “Improving Health and Nutrition,” the award recognizes the efforts of schools in Southeast Asia to implement programs “to improve health and nutrition of students that also transform schools into a healthy learning environment.”
Implemented together with the Department of Education-Laguna Division and the University of the Philippines Los Baños, the Searca-led School and Home Gardens program innovated on the old concept of school gardens to focus on three interrelated areas of intervention—learning by doing food-production activities (education), improved food diversity and availability (nutrition) and savings on food costs and added income (economics).
Searca sees that applying this twist to an old concept as one way to heighten appreciation for agriculture among the youth and attract new blood to the study of agriculture and create a new generation of professionals in this field.
Searca Director Gil C. Saguiguit Jr. said that of Searca’s six pilot schools, Labuin Elementary School was earlier cited as the “most successful implementation of the School and Home Gardens program, which contributed significantly to the diversity and availability of food in the school and local community, and enhanced the knowledge and skills of students, their parents and teachers on sustainable food production and nutrition.”
He added that the school was also recognized as the best in community extension and forging partnerships with local government units. Among the pilot schools, it made the most headway in terms of the three areas of intervention and established important linkages at the local level to help sustain the program gains.
These feats have merited for the school the 2017 Seameo-Japan ESD Award, which promotes and shares “initiatives and good practices that support sustainable development through the improvement of health and nutrition in school plans, teaching and learning practices, and daily routines of students.” The first and second prizes went to an elementary school in Malaysia and Myanmar, respectively.
The awards will be presented to the three schools at the opening ceremony of the 40th High Officials Meeting of Seameo in Bangkok, Thailand, on November 29.
Alma S.M. Tomacruz, principal of Labuin Elementary School, will accept the award on behalf of the school.