145. PRIMA VEA, L.E.T. RANK 1 FROM ISABELA

                                PRIMA VEA, L.E.T. RANK 1 FROM ISABELA

                                                            Dr. Troy Alexander G. Miano

                                                                                        1 December 2021

I cannot explain my joy when I came to know the news that the topnotcher for the secondary level in the recently concluded Licensure Examinations for Teachers (LET) hailed from our dear province of Isabela, Ms. Roslyn Vea Domingo Damasco. I browsed her Facebook account and scheduled a visit at her home after lunch today. I also learned that the September 26 national exam pride is a niece of my former staff at the Isabela Tourism Office (ITO), Ms. Jessah Andrea Reynaldo Domingo of Barangay Barucboc in Quezon town. During Jessah’s stay in the ITO, she temporarily resided at her older sister’s house whose daughter is this year’s Number 1. Jessah owns the Andrea’s Paper Beads which is featured in the coffee table book of the Department of Trade and Industry.

Two years ago, I also took the LET on March 24, 2019 and the result came out after 42 working days on May 25 and saw my name under number 14336. Together with ITO staff who passed the same exam, Ms. Rodamae L. Allam and Ms. Honeylet M. Dela Cruz, we took the oath of professionals conducted by the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) and the Board for Professional Teachers (BPT) on Rizal’s 158^th birthday on June 19 of the same year. Passing the examination made me feel that I am now a bonafide teacher, a Licensed Professional Teacher (LPT). I have been an instructor in college and graduate school including ETEEAP (Expanded Tertiary Education Equivalency and Accreditation Program) since June 2013 at the Isabela State University (ISU) in Cauayan City and the University of La Salette (ULS) in Santiago City and I always felt I am a half-cooked teacher eventhough I have my Doctor in Public Administration until the fateful day when I passed the LET.

I was told that my grade is relatively high which I never really gave attention until I was informed that it was a good score by the father of Roslyn when I visited their abode at Villa Jesusa Subdivision, Bliss Village, in the Capital-City of Ilagan. Roslyn, nicknamed Vea, was the eldest daughter of Mr. Manuel Rimorin Damasco III of Ilagan and the former Vanessa Reynaldo Domingo of Quezon, Isabela. She was born on November 29, 1998 in the then municipality of Ilagan and have a younger sister by the name Mia Vianca. Vea finished her elementary and high school at the Ilagan East Central Elementary School and at the Isabela National High School, respectively. She took up Secondary Education major in Special Education minor in Mathematics at the University of the Philippines (UP) in Diliman and finished Magna Cum Laude. As we shared light moments during my short stay, we reminisced our trek in the UP campus. I narrated to her that I took up Associate in Arts at UP Diliman and would normally stay at the tambayan area for organizations at the Vinzons Hill complex and settled my dinners at the barbecue stand down the road where rice was sold wrapped in coconut leaves. 

Vea already practiced her craft long before the LET. She was a demo teacher at the Readability Center in Quezon City (Filipino), Batino Elementary School-SPED Center (Reading Comprehension), Grain Foundation for PWD, Inc. (Mathematics) also in Quezon City and the University of the Philippines Integrated School (Mathematics). Furthermore, she was also a teacher aid at the Alternative Learning Resource School Philippines in Quezon City and at the Valenzuela SPED Center. Moreover, Vea was a student teacher in Mathematics at the Worldlab School Inc. also in Quezon City.

Vea was also active in the UP community being an officer and member of the University of the Philippines Educator’s Circle, University of the Philippines Kalipunan ng mga Anak ng Isabela, The Philippine Collegian and the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi. She helped organize various events and programs in the campus. She was also an active officer and member of the United Methodist Church Youth Fellowship since 2011.

Vea was invited for a testimony documented by the Falculan Twin’s Review Center (FTRC), formerly Brainspeed LET Review Center, where she underwent an online review. She narrated her journey in attaining the number 1 spot with a score of 93.4%. After graduating on June 2019, she had barely three months to prepare for the September LET on the same year. She did not take the aforementioned exam since she and her family underwent a series of emotional hardship when her maternal lola got terribly ill and died. Furthermore, she was not able to take the next exam dated March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The September 2020 and March 2021 tests were cancelled as well because of the worldwide deadly disease protocols and quarantine restrictions. 

Vea received her best birthday gift when the result of the long overdue exam was released on the same day she was celebrating her 23^rd natal day, November 29. In the recorded interview by the FTRC, she articulated, “When I learned about it, humagulgol ako ulit sa iyak. Parang bumalik lahat, bumalik lahat ng failures, lahat ng hardwork, lahat lahat nang nangyari sa akin simula noong 4^th year high school ako na naging pangarap ko mag LET hanggang sa ngayon. I kept on crying. I kept on saying Thank you God, thank you God, Thank you God. God’s timing is perfect. If something is meant to be yours, no pandemic, no trials can snatch that from you. It’s yours and yours and you will get it in His own will and in His own timing”

Vea further imparted, “I just want to share how a silver is made. From an ore, the ore of a silver is a rock, it will be exposed to a lot of intense heat and pressure para lumabas yung silver. I felt like an ore, God exposed me to intense heat and pressure in order for the silver of me to come out. Right now all glory to God and I can’t do this without God.”

After the glorious news came and aside from receiving unending calls, texts, radio interviews from well wishers both personally and through social media, Vea will be invited in the august halls of the Sangguniang Panlungsod of Ilagan and the  Sangguniang Panlalawigan of Isabela to be honored for her outstanding feat. Isabeleños led by Governor Rodolfo “Rodito” T. Albano III and Vice Governor Faustino “Bojie” G. Dy III are very proud of you Prima Vea. Continue to be a role model to the youth and aspiring LPTs and bring more laurels to our beloved homeland, the Queen Province of the Philippines.