The UP Asian Center successfully held the Student Orientation for newly admitted students for the First Semester of Academic Year 2024-2025 on 17 August 2024, a few days before the start of classes, at the Seminar Room, GT-Toyota Asian Cultural Center.

The activity sought to familiarize 26 new graduate students with the Center’s academic programs and policies, student resources, facilities, and other university policies. New students of the Asian Center’s Philippine Studies (specializing in Development Studies, Foreign Relations, and Socio-Cultural Studies) and Asian Studies programs (specializing in China, Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and West Asia) participated in the orientation.

Dean Henelito A. Sevilla, Jr. delivered the welcome remarks while AC’s most senior Professor Matthew M. Santamaria provided an overview of the Asian and Philippine Studies graduate programs. College Secretary Dr. Maria Dulce F. Natividad discussed how students can successfully navigate their programs, focusing on program requirements, coursework, comprehensive exams, thesis writing, and working with program and thesis advisers. The Asian Center staff also provided information on available resources, activities, and services offered by both the Center and the university, such as the website and social media pages, webinars and fora, faculty publications and the Asian Studies Journal, the museum, scholarships, and student health and well-being.

Student Life Series Workshops

The afternoon session  began with a tour of the Asian Center Museum’s ongoing exhibits. To complement the Student Orientation, two Student Life Workshop Sessions were held. The first was a library orientation facilitated by the AC library staff. College Librarian, Jhona Calamanan, gave a comprehensive orientation about resources of the Asian Center Library with a fun question-and-answer game full of prizes. The second student life workshop session was a Gender Sensitivity Orientation crash course courtesy of UP Center for Gender Women Studies Training Officer, Gina Rose Chan. Ms. Chan gave a short but loaded crash course on the basic concepts and the university's Gender Sensitivity Culture and policies on Anti-Sexual Harassment. 

The student orientation for new students and the student life workshop series are held every semester. 

MORE PHOTOS FROM THE EVENT

The Asian Center, University of the Philippines Diliman offers M.A. degrees in Asian Studies with four fields of specialization: Northeast Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and West Asia. The UP Asian Center also has an M.A. program in Philippine Studies that allows students to major in Philippine society and culture, Philippine foreign relations, or Philippine development studies. It also offers a Ph.D. program in Philippine Studies in conjunction with the College of Arts and Letters and the College of Social Sciences and Philosophy. For an overview of these graduate programs, click here. As an area studies institution, the Asian Center also publishes Asian Studies: Journal of Critical Perspectives on Asia, the latest issue of which can be downloaded at the journal's website.