Saipan Simbang Gabi Group turns over $11K for new PH classrooms

Officers and members of the Saipan Simbang Gabi Group turned over yesterday a check worth $11,712.34 for the “Classroom Galing sa Mamamayang Pilipino Abroad” to Consul General Medardo Macaraig and welfare officer Julie Fabian at the Filipino Workers Resource Center.

The donation from the non-profit organization will be used to build two new classrooms for the Tangaoan Elementary School in Sta. Maria, Ilocos Sur, the Philippines.

“Classroom Galing sa Mamamayang Pilipino Abroad” (Classroom from Filipino citizens abroad) is a classroom-building project that seeks to relieve the critical shortage of classrooms in the country.

Saipan Simbang Gabi Group decides where to build classrooms based on information provided by the Philippine Overseas Labor Office, which identifies schools in depressed areas in the Philippines that are in dire need of classrooms.

“We’re happy that there will again be students who will benefit from the new classrooms that will be built using this donation,” Macaraig said after the check presentation. “It will help alleviate the shortage of classrooms in the Philippines.”

Saipan Simbang Gabi Group president Marcelino G. Pacson disclosed that it took them three years to collect donations coming mostly from parishioners of Mount Carmel Cathedral, which is home to the holiday tradition among Filipinos after which the group was named.

“We value the support that the community has given for this classroom project. If not for them, construction of two new classrooms for the students of Tangaoan Elementary School will not materialize. I hope that they will continue to help other people and carry on the tradition of simbang gabi (dawn mass),” Pacson told Saipan Tribune.

However, with the impending closure of the Philippine Consulate General on Saipan, which helps facilitate the project, Pacson said they are thinking of going in a new direction for their next project.

Macaraig announced in February the decision of the Department of Foreign Affairs to include the Saipan Consulate general among the consular posts that will be closed down within the year. Its last day is on Oct. 31.

Among their possible projects, Pacson said, is to provide scholarships for young men who aspire to be priests in the future.

Pacson added that the group plans to bring to Saipan within the year a healing priest in support of health and spiritual growth of community members.