UP BCS holds Bridging Program, Game Night as Assistance Program fundraisers

To aid Biochemistry students and professors in the coming semester’s online classes, the University of the Philippines Biochemistry Society (UP BCS) opened the UP BCS Bridging Program and Game Night to the public on August 17 and 28, respectively, to raise funds for the organization’s Financial Assistance Program.

When asked about the reason behind the creation of the three-week long Bridging Program, Lee De Velez, Vice President for Academic Affairs and Co-head of the Bridging Program explained that “we [program heads] noticed that the professors were extremely busy preparing the course packs and had no time to prepare bridging courses; we wanted to support them by arranging one ourselves.”

Said program was launched after surveying the Biochemistry students’ capability and attitude towards online classes. In this survey, 88.1% of the respondents mentioned having prior experience with online classes however, only 38.1% are comfortable with these classes.

In total, 20 volunteer instructors composed of students, alumni, and professionals, and 174 students from different colleges in the university signed up for the program.

Sandra Villaluz, 3rd Year Batch Representative and Co-head of the Bridging Program mentioned that she feels motivated to serve more given the success of the program. Additionally, she said, “As we are currently in a pandemic, I wanted to be relevant and help the community even in the small-scale, like serving the Biochemistry Society.”

Despite being a fundraiser, the UP BCS Bridging Program was free however, participants were provided with donation channels should they wish to help raise funds for the UP BCS Assistance Program.

On the other hand, Andre Santos, Vice President for Internal Affairs spearheaded the launching of the open-to-all Game Night as another means of raising funds for the organization’s assistance program.

Said Game Night revolved around the theme of food hence the name “Now Serving.” It was conducted through Zoom and Kahoot with 21 teams participating.

Team Siomainyo prevailed as winner with members Christiana Lagudas, Aimee Domingo, Mia Gonzales, Digna Mercado, Allyssa Mendoza, Naomie Halili and thus, they received a cash prize worth PHP250.

Asked about the goal and success of the Game Night, Andre said that “the goal of the game night was to gather money to fund biochemistry students that need financial assistance in continuing their studies despite the online nature of the semester and also for the members and non-members to have fun.” In addition, he said, “I believe our participants had fun and we were able to collect enough from the event.”

As of publication, the UP Biochemistry Society was already able to raise PHP 32 884.11 from donations and game night registration fees. This will be used to give weekly assistance to three priority students and emergency assistance to both students and professors.

The organization will continue to accept donations and conduct monthly Game Nights in order to ensure the sustainability of the aforementioned program. Donation channels can be found in the official Facebook page of the UP Biochemistry Society.