PGMA inaugurates Ifugao State University

LAMUT, Ifugao — President Arroyo and ranking officials of the Commission on Higher Education inaugurated here Wednesday the Ifugao State University (IFSU), the second State University in the Cordillera.

The IFSU was created by virtue of Republic Act 9720 which converted the Ifugao State College of Agriculture and Forestry and its other extension campuses into a university to enhance tertiary education to the far flung communities in the country.

Ms Arroyo signed RA 9720 into law last Oct. 14, 2009 at Malacañang but opted to lead the inauguration rites in order to visit the province and inspect the world famous Ifugao rice terraces, considered as the 8th Wonder of the World.

The new law capped six years of effort to establish a university in Ifugao.

The quest to university status started in 2003 with the crafting of ISCAF’s eight-year development plan that embodies its vision, mission and eight major development goals distributed among its four-fold thrust of instruction, research, extension and production services.

On June 21, 2007, the effort of ISCAF officials to transform the school into university started to pay off when the Department of Budget and Management and CHEd, the ones recognizing the stage of development of state universities and colleges (SUC’s), elevated ISCAF to SUC Level III from SUC Level I.

Benguet State University in La Trinidad, Benguet was the first State University established in the Cordillera on initiative of provincial lawmakers resulting to law signed by then President Corazon C. Aquino in January 1987. – Dexter A. See