Life Education Session at Guang Ming College - Tagaytay

Likhaan conducted a Life Education Session at Guang Ming College, Tagaytay as part of their curriculum on September 10 and 17, 2022. Fifty-five (55) freshmen students from the mentioned college attended this face-to-face setting. The session started with Mr. Andrei dela Cruz from Likhaan and Ms. Sabate of Guang Ming College gave the introduction for the Life-Education Session.

Dr. Junice Melgar began the first session by discussing "Ang Sarap at Hirap ng Kabataang Tumatanda," in which she highlighted the various aspects of adolescence, including physical, sexual, mental/physiological, and psycho-social development. She also highlighted the enabling environments for youth health, such as CSE-SRH and violence prevention. She assigned the students homework that included extensive 24-hour self-reflection of what they do in their everyday lives.

Following the discussion, Erickson Bernardo of Likhaan kicked off the second session with the topic "Sari-Sari, Iba-iba: Let's Talk Sex, Gender, and Sexuality." The second session focused on the spectrum of sexual expression, gender identity, and expression in society. He also informed students in identifying personal prejudices, assumptions, and judgments about gender, gender expression, sexuality, sexual expression, relationships, and the sexual behavior of others. He engages the students in a role-playing session of typical gender stereotypes that they are aware of and how to handle these gender stereotypes.

In the afternoon, Hope from Likhaan led session 3 with the topic "Be Unkabogable! A Guide to Personal Safety," where she gave a lecture on how students may empower themselves to safeguard against violence and abuse and to avoid injury. She also discussed that bullying, discrimination, domestic and sexual violence is a form of Gender-Based Violence regardless of their orientation. She presented a video for the students to ponder on, such as "Don't Confuse Love & Abuse by Sunshine."

Dr. Junice Melgar ended the first day's discussions with the fourth session entitled, "Gaano Kadalas ang Praning? Understanding Mental Health and Mental Illness in Children and Adolescents." Junice lectured the students on the necessity of taking care of one's own mental health and being aware of the warning signals of mental illness/conditions. Persons who do not have mental illnesses can suffer mental discomfort, while people who do have mental illnesses can be well. People react differently to stress. She also encouraged everyone to help raise awareness about mental health.

Facilitators assigned students homework assignments that included lecture materials, session assessments, and reflection tasks. On the second day of Life-Education Sessions started by Ms. Caren Pineda from Likhaan began the fifth session with the topic "TBH-IRL: Common Health Problems of Young People." She gave some crucial points such as physical and mental changes occur at various times for each individual. She also stated that keeping healthy entails maintaining strong connections with others.

She went on to the following session with the subject "SHOOKT! Pregnancy, Motherhood, and Parenting mean to a Young Person" sharing that pregnancy has an impact on the physical and emotional health of young people, particularly girls. Complications can develop throughout pregnancy, during delivery, and after birth. Parenting at a young age entails a significant amount of responsibility. Most of the time, young parents require assistance. Caren involved the students in an exercise by providing a "pregnancy test game," which allowed her to evaluate the students' reflections and reactions when they received the results of their "pregnancy test."

Meanwhile, Arnold Vega from Likhaan started off the seventh session with the theme "Know Your Choice! Available Family Planning at the Clinic," emphasizing the need of providing correct information to young people about contraceptives for appropriate contraceptive choices. He also discusses the contraceptives offered at Likhaan Clinic and how they are used. He included an activity called “4 Pics 1 Word” to engage students in discussions about contraception use and availability.

To end the day 2 sessions, Andrei Dela Cruz from Likhaan presented “Status: It’s Complicated – Let’s Talk About RTIs. STI and HIV” discussing the various sexually transmitted infections, their symptoms, and how to prevent them. HIV and STIs were among the topics mentioned, and he also advised the students to educate themselves and get examined if they wanted to know their status. The session also involved a role-playing exercise during which the students acted as people and workers suspected of transmitting STIs and HIV. They even incorporated a "money or basket" game to illustrate high, low, and no-risk sexual behaviors.

The 2-day sessions, students’ engagement through different activities like role playing, interactive games, and activities (movie reviews, essays, poems, video reactions) reflected on and internalize the sessions they had attended on what it the importance of the different sessions on them.