FEATURE | Great Power and its Great Responsibility
By Simone Antoinette Chavez
With most children, beloved Pisay scholars included, growing up around stories of grandeur, heroism, and adventure, the youthful wish of being “special” is not uncommon. Like the wizards of Harry Potter who are chosen by virtue of family line or the Marvel superheroes who suddenly sprout with unearthly capabilities, at some point in their lives, kids hope that they too have magic of their own.
It is not too soon, however, that the reality of the world kicks in. No child is exempted from this. Most go on to discover their “unique” (but not so supernatural) capabilities and in the case of the Philippine Science High School (PSHS), this superpower proves to be their skill in matters related to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Points arise in the life of a scholar where they are tested and crossroads emerge where they are met with a choice.
A prime exhibit of this, while not as occult as a dystopian movie’s special classes or Hogwarts’ famed houses, is a scholar’s decision on which elective class to enter. As arguments and contemplations meet in the orientation hall, one prepares for the path of specialization they shall take for the next nine months.
“Actually, choosing microbiology as my elective last year was far from difficult,” said a microbiology student we shall be referring to as “Mhie”, as they chose to stay anonymous. “With no supplementary videos or visual advertisements like those elective teachers who came before her, I recall Ma’am Minette going up to the front and easily capturing both our attention and, eventually, our hearts. By that time, I didn’t have an inclination toward any of the three core sciences. But I think her passion for micro really made its way to my thinking and it had me realizing that maybe I could love biology as a subject too.”
However, the study of life is, by all means, a difficult endeavor. “There are a lot of terms that you have to memorize. A lot of labwork and procedures as well. We were always told that the microbiology class was special, considering how it was one of the long-standing electives before the pandemic. Arguably, we had the most hands-on laboratory experience. We had the most resources accessible to us. Then, we were also the only lump of people who would need to climb three flights of stairs after what could be a math exam or heavy rain to reach our classroom. We were also the ones who felt completely blind to what our possible grades could be.”
A recurring theme in a scholar’s life is that being special does not come without its costs. As elementary education teaches students to be generalists, this perspective undergoes a shift once one steps into the four walls of a Pisay campus. Some are good with numbers, others have a way of absorbing physiological processes, and so on and so forth. Under the stress of studying and the pressure to excel in at least one area, arrives a realization that the reward of being different (and the struggles that come with it) is finding out that you can still be more special than you already are.
With the kind of opportunities that the advanced PSHS curriculum offers, scholars are opened to a world seemingly exclusive to the cream of the crop. Elective classes and their practical coverage are hallmark examples of this fact.
“We worked with the tools often. We learned how to streak bacteria, which Ma’am Minette provided from her own personal labwork. We learned how to do a bacterial smear and how to extract chemicals from plant leaves and how to test them against different organisms,” Mhie recalled. However, while niche topics like this are common conversations on campus, that is not so much the case for the rest of the educational world. “Ma’am Minette put our class on a high ground, definitely. But on the days we would not have labs, she’d tell us about her experience as a biologist outside her role as a Pisay teacher. She told us about schools without proper facilities and faculties writing to her if she could help teach their students. She even told us that after our training under her, maybe we could pass our knowledge on microbiology on to other people as well.” Mhie says that one of the most eye-catching things about their lessons was that it “wasn’t always about science”.
At some point, scholars begin to digest the core values found in every uniform badge and recited every Monday at the flag ceremony: that, aside from excellence, it is equally as important to remember service. The cream of the crop, after all, is rendered fruitless if knowledge merely reverberates in closed echo chambers.
“I find it funny that we were even called ‘an elite class’, but then Ma’am Minette would always welcome students who wanted to sit in and always repeat how everyone was welcome in microbiology,” Mhie said. Being special, at this juncture, has a cost, comes with a reward, and offers a job.
Such as there is esteem to being special, there is an honor of equal magnitude to sharing it with the world. A lesson from the microbiology class, we learned that biology is not to be kept under lock and key. Beyond the intellect studying genes, bacteria, and the plethora of fungal species in one backyard is the ability of a scholar to make the “study of life” mean much more than microscopes and inoculating loops. With this, students are imbued with the superpower of giving a deeper, more social, and transformative meaning to what they do as scientists.
