By Edward Pormilos
Participants of CPUFOAAI Zoom Meeting.
The Central Philippine University Federation of Overseas Alumni Association, Inc. held its first meeting for 2023 via Zoom last February 18, 2023 under the new leadership. Presided by its new President, Engr. Lee Plagata, the meeting was participated by a total of 21 attendees, composed of officers, advisers, chapter presidents, and guests.
Since it was the first meeting of the new leadership team, time was given to get to know each participant. Prof. Jeofrey Geroche, President of Thailand Chapter, presented the overview of a proposed demographic study of Centralians abroad. The study is one of the new initiatives of the Federation and aims to supplement its future website proposal. Still on its exploratory stage, more discussions will follow on the aspect of the study’s scope, confidentiality of information, and the extent of Federation involvement.
The main agenda of the meeting was the next Global Reunion. Past President Rod Gonzales gave a brief background on past attempts to start planning but was deferred by the pandemic. Mrs. Meriam Amy, new President of Greater Toronto Area Chapter, reported the result of their last Chapter’s meeting. She cited that the GTA Chapter is prepared to host the next Global Reunion in 2025 and they have already started to create some working committees. She also presented an initiative to raise seed money for the Reunion by looking for 20 volunteers to recruit 4 alumni who will pay $200 as early registration. This will generate a total of $20,000 to cover for the reservation of venues and other expenses. After further deliberations, it was decided to hold further discussions on the details of this fund-raising proposal. A concern was raised about the potential impact to the attendance of the Global Reunion of the CCI (Nursing group) reunion at CPU in February 2025. It was asserted that the Global Reunion is inclusive to all groups and should not be impacted by other reunions. There was also a discussion of utilizing 501-C3 non-profit status of the Federation as this has benefited past hosting of reunions in the US. After a thorough deliberation, it was unanimously approved to hold the next Global Reunion in Toronto, Canada in July 10-13, 2025. More discussions on the details of preparations will follow.
With the schedule of the next Global Reunion now in placed, everyone looks forward to it with excitement after years of postponement due to pandemic.