Silliman University in Dumaguete City said it continues to yearn for better days, and affirms its hopes and aspirations as it celebrates its 119th Founders’ Day on August 9 to 31, on the theme “Hope Arising from the Solid Rock”, the Rock being Jesus Christ himself, a press release from the SU administration said.
SU president Betty Cernol McCann said the “theme depicts what we are all going through individually and as a Silliman community amid this COVID-19 pandemic. Prospects of getting back to a normal life seem black and bleak.”
Earl Jude Paul Cleope, vice president for Academic Affairs and chairperson of the Founders’ Day Executive Committee, meanwhile, explained the design and color of the proposed FD T-shirt in saying, “This Rock is Jesus, the One who gives light to Silliman represented by the SU Hall, attesting to the fact that after 119 years, it has remained strong as it is founded on the Rock.”
Cleope admitted that there are always challenges, however, they “bring out the light, filling us with hope in sustaining us especially during these times of uncertainties”, the press release said.
Elizabeth Susan Vista Suarez, dean of the College of Performing and Visual Arts and co-chair of the FDEC, added that “the iconic Silliman Hall stood strong and tall, weathering storms over a century, in pursuit of Christian education for what was then 15 and now 10,000, and counting.”
“Silliman Hall represents Silliman University. The very place where it all began. It was then the classroom, church, graduation hall, and dormitory. Our humble beginnings began here,” the press release added.*
