Part 1 Academic Leadership in Social Education and Cultural Development

Dr. Azanza has been an educator for more than twenty (20) years. He spent most of his professional life as a social education teacher and researcher focusing on social and cultural studies. He started teaching social science and sociology subjects in 1991 at the Department of Sociology in UP Diliman; and human resources development and industrial relations subjects at the UP School of Labor and Industrial Relations (UP-SOLAIR). From there, he went on to become a well-published academic leader and researcher. Not so many social education teachers of his age could accomplish what Dr. Azanza has done in his field of expertise. At 39 years old, he has already written seven (7) books and more than thirty (30) academic papers, articles and researches.

His commitment to social and cultural development studies has brought him to folklore research, a field only very few social scientists would find serious interest because of the low economic returns despite its being physically tiring, time consuming, financially draining, and most of the time frustrating due to the difficulty in finding source materials and key informants even after spending so much effort in the field, libraries and museum. In fact, the specific field of interest of Dr. Azanza which is oral folklore research is much more challenging as it requires highly specialized research and documentation capabilities.

As the term denotes, oral folklore is not documented and is extremely dependent on the recollection of the key resource persons who orally transmit it across generations. This is the reason why in 1989, during the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) General Conference in Paris, France, a resolution was adopted “to safeguard and protect folklore, particularly oral traditions that are extremely fragile and at risk of getting lost”. This resulted in the Hudhud chants of the Ifugaos and the Darangen epic of the Maranaos being declared by the UNESCO as masterpieces of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity. UNESCO, however, emphasized that there are many more oral folklore that need to be saved and protected.

Dr. Azanza also a served as a member of the Board of Directors of the British Alumni Association. Dr. Azanza did research works at the Cordillera Studies Center and wrote for the “Ti Similla” while he was a faculty member at UP Baguio in 1992. He was also involved in 1993 as a sociologist and field Researcher for a study on the indigenous Dumagat people in Gabaldon, Nueva Ecija under the Environmental Research Division, Manila Observatory, Ateneo de Manila University. In 1997, he was appointed Research Fellow at the UP Law Center and wrote the Japanese Influences at Work: Perspective from Selected Filipino Workers, in the book Image and Reality: Philippine-Japan Relations Towards the 21^st Century, published by the UP Law Center and funded by the Japan Foundation.

In 2003, with the advent of e-learning, Dr. Azanza formed the Philippine National e-Learning Association (PNEA) as part of his advocacy for the use of e-learning to complement the traditional mode of teaching social education, arts, culture and other related subjects. Through the years, Dr. Azanza has distinguished himself as a respected academic leader in the field of social education and cultural development. His views matter whenever there are relevant issues that arise within his field of expertise. Thus, Dr. Azanza is regularly invited as a resource person whenever there are public/TV forum/discussions on matters relating to social and cultural development.

This was the challenge that Dr. Azanza took on and led him to his research on the “Alamat ng Mandaluyong”, a more than 400-year old oral folklore that was in great danger of extinction and has already branched out to three (3) seemingly conflicting versions because of human frailty and the tendency to have selective memory on the part of some elders who could recall the legend. Dr. Azanza is credited by the Philippine Folklore Society (PFS), the foremost national organization of folklore scholars, professors and researchers since 1958, for this outstanding folklore research which preserved and protected the more than 400-year old oral folklore “Alamat ng Mandaluyong” which was already on the verge of extinction. He was also hailed by the local officials of the City of Mandaluyong for preserving, protecting and promoting the endangered oral folklore.

As an academic administrator, Dr. Azanza has phenomenally climbed up the academic ladder and was designated Director of the UP System Human Resource Development Office (1994); Acting Vice Chancellor for Administration of UP Diliman (1995); College Secretary of the UP School of Labor and Industrial Relations (1996); Vice President of the AMA Group of Companies (1997); Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs of the AMA University (2000); Chief Operations Officer of AMA University. Upon his early retirement from AMA University, he served as an International Consultant for an Asian Development Bank (ADB) project in Central Asia. Upon his return to the country, he worked as a CEO of a BPO and Call Center Company, and eventually put up Cosmotec Contact Centre, his own call center company located in EDSA Cubao, Quezon City as well as a technical school, now known as the Cosmotec College.