Lectures and books are not the only way students learn. Others, especially those in fields like the culinary or performing arts, learn more effectively by doing the particular skills required by their discipline.

A graduate of St. Paul’s University Quezon City’s (SPUQC) Hotel and Restaurant Management (HRM) course, for instance, can easily plan and execute a menu, shop, prepare, cook and serve a multi-course dinner anytime, including dishwashing afterwards. After all, he or she has actually done all that at the school’s culinary center which has its own walk-in chiller, ovens and all the other backroom facilities of a first-class restaurant.

It’s the same for the Mass Communications graduate, who will most effectively assimilate the nuances of good editing in a bricks-and-mortar editing room where she can actually cut and put together scenes she recorded.

To reinforce the fields where learning is best picked up by doing, rather than just hearing someone lecture about it, the university has invested in a range of impressive facilities. In addition to the training center for culinary and hotel management, SPUQC also houses a mini hotel, a replica of an intensive care unit, as well as a laboratory for students of science-oriented courses.

 Its TV and radio studios were set up in earlier decades when the school was still an all-girls’ enclave already well known for its Communications course. All these are to ensure that graduates can easily make the transition from the campus to the real-world work milieu.

HANDS-ON LEARNING

 “Our learning labs have particularly benefitted students who may not be very interested in lectures but do well in the practical skills,” says Rosario Ramos, HRM assistant program chairman.

 These are often pupils who have great motor control, excellent hand-eye coordination and dexterity as against those who tend to be more analytical and logical or more expressive with words. The last two, according to the theory of Multiple Intelligences proposed by Gardner, excel in cognitive skills while the strength of the former revolves around psycho-motor skills.

These labs have helped students further hone their talents, gain confidence and even win metro-wide competitions. Among them are winners of a silver medal for on-the-spot cake decorating  at the National Food Showdown, and a medal in the table-setting contest at the Café on Parade.

The university also has laboratories for its IT, Entrepreneurship, and Accounting courses.

 SPUQC has come a long way since the 60s and 70s when it was an exclusive all-girls college. When it became part of the St. Paul University system in 2004, it began to take on the atmosphere and vibrance of the bigger St. Paul University campuses in Iloilo, Dumaguete, and Tuguegarao.

The best endorsers of the school, nevertheless, are the students themselves. HRM undergraduate Kevin Rayos states that because SPUQC has a limited population, students like him have greater access to the equipment and facilities than others from universities with larger populations. Furthermore, teachers, many of whom are practitioners in their own industries, have more occasions to supervise their students. “Tinututukan kami,” he says.

HRM senior Samantha So reveals that her experience in operating kitchen equipment in her freshmen and sophomore years have enabled her to easily meet the demands of her internship training as a buffet attendant and server at a resort club in the US.

Because students have had many occasions to learn by doing, they can easily adapt to the real world after graduation. In so doing, they make their school proud of their accomplishments.