March 29, 2024
KABALIKAT AWARDEE — Baguio City Rep. Mark Go has been conferred the national “Kabalikat Award” by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority during the 28th Tesda anniversary in Taguig City on Aug. 30 for championing the cause of the agency. Go authored the Cordillera State Institute of Technical Education or CSITE Law and chairs the Lower House Committee on Higher and Technical Education. — TESDA handout photo

Baguio Rep. Mark O. Go bagged an award from the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority for helping advance technical and vocation education.

Go was awarded the national winner in Tesda’s Kabalikat Awards under the legislative category.

He authored the Cordillera State Institute of Technical Education Law. He is the chair of the Lower House Committee on Higher and Technical Education and one of his notable accomplishments in the advancement of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) is the provision of assistance through a scholarship program to 2,190 poor students.

The scholarship amounted to P43,764,917.97.

Go also proposed the house bill 6996 or the Department of Technical Education and Skills Development (DTESD) Act of 2020, which aimed to be the primary policy formulation, planning, coordinating, implementing, regulating and administrative entity of the government for technical education and training and certification policies, plans, and programs.

The law is seen to be instrumental in addressing the jobs mismatch between TVET policies and programs and approving training standards and assessment packages as established and conducted by private industries.

Coffee enthusiast Melvin T. Olicia from La Trinidad, Benguet, meanwhile was declared second runer-up in the Idols ng Tesda for the Self-Employed Category and Batang TechnoPreneur.

Olicia is a multi-skilled TVET trainer and a holder of national certificates in Commercial Cooking (NC IV), Cookery (NCII), Events Management Services (NCIII), Food and Beverages (NCII), Commercial Cooking (NC III), and Tourism Promotion Services (NC II).

He is also a certified TVET trainer in Events Management Services NCIII.

His skills and experiences motivated him together and his team to conceptualize the Farm-to-Cup DIY Brew Bar in Pico La Trinidad, which aims to enhance the coffee industry by offering technical vocational courses related to coffee on coffee planting, coffee processing and coffee productions and its preparation and serving, and even its business opportunities.

Olicia and his partners in the Philippine Nazarene College and Gintong Aral aim to encourage the youth in the different municipalities to enroll as Tesda scholars, particularly in the coffee-related courses, which they could use in their towns to further improve the coffee industry in the province.

The Kabalikat Awards is held annually to honor Tesda’s most active and outstanding partners who have assisted the agency in developing, enhancing and implementing training programs that have resulted in better employability of Filipino skilled workers. The Idols ng Tesda is awarded to outstanding TVET graduates who are gainfully employed either as wage workers or are managing their own businesses and have contributed to the socio-economic improvements in their respective communities. – Press release