The Union Theological Seminary (UTS) will hold its 98th commencement exercises at 4 p.m. on April 1 at the Grace Open Air Chapel on the UTS campus in Dasmariñas, Cavite, with Rep. Cynthia A. Villar as commencement speaker.

The Baccalaureate Service will be held at 7:30 p.m. at the Salakot Chapel, with Very Rev. Tomas S. Maddela as speaker.

Class 2006 will hold its Baccalaureaate Service on Friday, March 31, at 7:30 p.m.

The theme is "Pasasalamat, Pagdiriwang, Patuloy na Pagtugon sa Hamon ng Panahon" which is the UTS theme for the centennial anniversary celebration on Nov. 22-23, 2007.

The seminary was established in Manila in 1907 as an ecumenical, theological formation center jointly sponsored by the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP) and the United Methodist Church (UMC). It later moved to its new campus in Dasmariñas, Cavite.

In commemoration of the Filipino-American centennial this year, the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program is conducting a series of public programs early next month highlighting various aspects of the Filipino-American experience.

Four renowned panelists will discuss the rich history of Filipino-American labor activism. They will cover important events such as labor organizing among farm workers in Hawaii and California and cannery workers in Alaska.

The panel will also discuss activism of the next generation and address contemporary issues facing Filipinos and FilipinoAmerican workers and the future of Filipino-Americans in the labor movement.

Filipino American Activism and the American Labor Movement, a panel discussion and the second of the Filipino American Centennial Commemoration events, will be held on April 14 at the Freer Gallery of Art, Meyer Auditorium on Independence Ave., Washington, D.C., from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.

Panelists include Augusto Espiritu, author and history professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Bill Sorro, community activist and board member of Manila Heritage Foundation; Cindy Domingo, board member of National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum and co-founder of the Carlos Bulosan Historical Project; and Tony Sarmiento, president and executive director of Senior Service America, Inc. and former Assistant Director of the AFL-CIO Education Department.

Moderator will be Gloria Caoile, former assistant to the president of AFSCME, AFL-CIO and current board member, Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA). (Roy C. Mabasa)

Well Drillers Association of the Philippines (Weldaphil) President Carlos B. Perez announced yesterday that a seminar on "Case Studies on Well Drilling and Operation and Maintenance of Production Wells’’ will be held on April 3-4 at the Supreme Hotel in Baguio City.

The two-day seminar, the Weldaphil Secretariat 4538298 said, will focus on problems encountered during well drilling and operation and maintenance of production wells.

The course will tackle, among others, well drilling problem on sites selection which results to dry hole or very low yield, poor water quality, high iron and saline water; problem during well construction especially when selected well drilling method is inappropriatete, remedial measures when loss of circulation occurs, casings and screen failed to reach target depth due to borehole collapse, and volume of gravel pack materials installed is inadequate resulting to sand pumping;

Operation of production wells which involve decline of well yield, sand pumping, salt water intrusion, lowering of pumping water level, and poor pump efficiency; and maintenance of production wells where problems encountered during well rehabilitation and pump maintenance.

An investigation on the alleged irregularities in the sale by farmer-beneficiaries of the land awarded to them by the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) under the Certificate of Land Operation Award (CLOA) in Pampanga to a private developer will be conducted by a task force headed by Director Teofilo Inocencio, chief of the DAR Region 3.

The task force will also look into the flagrant violations of the terms, conditions, and the 10-year prohibitory period in the CLOA and Emancipation Patent (EP).

Documents indicated that in November of 2004, the owner and the board of directors of the private developer of Lakeshore, a subdivision in Barangay San Rafael, Mexico, Pampanga, were allegedly selling and transferring the title and ownership of over 1,000 subdivision lots in the CLOA and Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP)-awarded land.

Records show that the private developer and the board of directors sold Lakeshore without a license to sell from the Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board (HLRB), a violation of Presidential Decree 957, an offense punishable by 10 years imprisonment. (Sel A. Baysa)

The Land Registration Authority (LRA) will conduct an investigation on personnel of the Register of Deeds of San Fernando City, Pampanga for allegedly transferring and registering the ownership and title of the lots to the private developer and other lot buyers without the required DAR clearance and license to sell from the HLURB.