A University President’s Takeoff From Shirt to Suits
By: NATHANLIE M. BALDOZA
What had been a walk to the market for one woman led to her running academic road maps. At 21, Nora found herself loaded with academic responsibilities clad in trousers and shirt, working alongside subordinates thrice her age.
Thirty-six years later, she heads a state university in southern Luzon that has almost 28,000- student population and more than a thousand working force.
Dr. Nora Lumbera-Magnaye lets this magazine take a peek of her challenges and triumphs and the undertakings she engages herself in that keep her standing tall all these years as president of Batangas State University (BatStateU).
As a university president, she leads by the principle of servant leadership. She has made it a priority to become a servant of God first before she can genuinely serve others. Her deep concern for others and close devotion to God could be traced from working with nuns and priests before and after she finished college, attempting to master the multifaceted management of self and others through witnessing for Christ. She could have been a nun had she not wanted a broader field of service beyond the confinement of a convent.
Indeed, Dr. Nora Lumbera- Magnaye found greater calling in the world when she was elected and formally installed to office as president of Batangas State University on July 17, 2006.
Through the years under her leadership, BatStateU has stabilized its operations substantiated by enrolment that has almost doubled after her first term of four years as university president. She attributes the improvements to the concerted
efforts of all stakeholders who take part in mapping out programs to better facilitate a holistic education.
“I am blessed to be surrounded by qualified and competent people who continue to help me in shaping the university to be the seat of academic excellence in the region,” she says, and adds that it would have been a lot harder for her to bring the university to where it is today without their help. The institution, she says, had faced challenges like unfinished buildings, inadequate facilities, ballooning debts and other concerns. But these, through strong determination and faith, she saw to completion and resolution.
Feminizing Machismo
Dr. Magnaye has rolled up her sleeves in working for the goodof the institution. She shrugs off machismo that she believes undermines women’s chances to succeed. “I proved my detractors wrong,” she says with a determined tone. With women at its helm, the university continues to attract not just local support but foreign as well by establishing international linkage with various learning institutions in Vietnam, Korea, Thailand and Malaysia. However, she is quick to refute the idea that women make successful leaders than men—or vice versa. Leaning back on her chair, she reflects, “At the end of the day, it will always be a question of what you have done for the community, meeting the kind of service the people expect from their leader—whether male or female.”
Making education accessible to the underserved, the poorest of the poor members of the community, stands out among Dr. Magnaye’s priority projects for the university. The Constitution mandates state universities to provide quality and
accessible education to all social classes. “So far, the quality of education that the university offers to its students is already on its way to excellence. We have globally competitive and marketable graduates who are imbued with moral courage, nurtured through values and excellent education. Our standing in board examinations has always been very good. We have managed to be on top especially in engineering board examinations,” exclaims this first woman president of the university.
Then, too, BatStateU has come up with programs that assist students from impoverished families. More than anyone else, underprivileged students are the
primary recipients of the services of the school. Dr. Magnaye says that the university has done a lot of legwork to ascertain the success of its programs. It requests politicians, NGOs and its alumni to give scholarship grants. Fifty percent
(50%) of the student population are grantees of scholarships.
However, the scope of her responsibilities sometimes puts her in situations that threaten to topple her good moral standing as a university president. She mingles
with acquaintances who sometimes ask for favors that contradict good moral uprightness and her own value system. “But I stand firm in my position by saying ‘NO’ to all issues that are offensive to moral sensibilities,” she affirms. “In my position, I meet sneaky people who tempt and charm me to do bad choices. I couldn’t have gone through all the challenges in my life if it were not for my healthy church life. My parents brought me up to fear God.”
God First
This fear has guided her in her decision-making that entails truth, justice and fairness. She recognizes God as her defender and best friend, especially at times of trials and difficulties. “He is always there to lift me up and cheer me. I believe that if God is with me, nobody can do things that will either harm me or put me down,” she says smiling as she puts her eyeglasses down.
Dr. Magnaye handles pressures with a cheerful disposition and total dependence on God. There are no such thought as lowest moments to her. She considers every moment of her life as something that makes her life more exciting and challenging. Each time she encounters problems, she tells herself that God will make a way to fix it, “Especially after I have already given the best of my efforts. I always remember my favorite passage in Galatians 6:9 ‘Do not get weary of doing good things for time will come that you will reap the fruits of your hard work, if you do not give up.’ I tell you it really works!”
The same principle applies to her family life. God first. As a wife and mother, she sees to it that God is the dominant figure in their household. As a result, their love for Him strengthens their love for each other. Though her professional obligations take most of her time and her children get somewhere with their respective careers, they take by heart the standing family rule to “let’s give time for each of us.”
Notwithstanding the physical distance between her and her children, Dr. Magnaye makes it a point to be with them during the most important moments in their lives. She flew to America when Glenn Joseph and his wife had their first child and traveled to Australia to be with Sharon Ellen when she also had her first baby.
However, when asked to rate herself as a mother, she right away responded that it is not fair for anyone to rate motherhood. “Motherhood is a lifetime commitment. If mothers could only give their own life to their children, they would do it,” explains this grandmother of two boys and two girls. “The achievements and the status in life of my children are the concrete proof of my life as a mother and grandmother.”
Fit to Lead
The talk shifts from food for thought to physical food.“I included the malunggay thing here,” she says half-jesting. We would know later that she makes shake from carrots, green apples, and other fruits with malunggay as the main ingredient. Malunggay,she notes, contains antioxidant as well as antiaging properties that delay the aging process.Although not a vegetarian, Dr. Magnaye eats a lot of fruits and vegetables. She gives importance to greens and living healthy because she knows “that the body is Godgiven and a sacred gift from God—a temple of the Holy Spirit.” Aside from flexing her muscles in the gym, she does gardening. She feels recharged every time she looks at her plants and finds fulfillment when she sees them flowering or bearing fruits.
“My disposition in life makes me younger, more striving and very optimistic. I always smile and look at things very positively,” she explains when we commended her of her youthful look. “I fly lightly. I carry only those that I can and I request God to carry the rest,” she says, putting stress on each word.
Dr. Magnaye wants to be remembered as a friend, mother, wife and leader who has stood the test of truth and emerged triumphant in all endeavors—either big or small. In fact, she had proven to be a woman-David who was able to topple giants with her courage, dignity, integrity, competence, uncompromised principles and values as her armor.
Furthermore, she wants history to record her as someone who sets out to the world in shirt and has been catapulted to the ranks garbed in suits of the academe—and has kept her robe spotless all throughout.
Nathanlie M. Baldoza is a staff member of Health & Home.
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