Professor Aleth Therese L. Dacanay, PhD, Dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy, has been appointed as the Chair of the Technical Panel for Pharmacy by the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd), which held the oath taking ceremonies on August 23, 2021 (Monday).
Dacanay, who has been Dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy since 2015, previously served as a Member of the old Technical Committee for Pharmacy in CHEd. She was a former President of the Philippine Association of Colleges of Pharmacy and is also an assessor of ASEAN University Network Quality Assurance.
According to Dacanay, the top priority of the panel is “to push for the release of the CHED Memorandum Order [prescribing the program standards and policies] for the BS Pharmacy program,” and will hopefully include the following: the training of preceptors and monitoring of schools, among others. The panel also aims to “assist the different pharmacy schools in the gradual transition to the limited face-to-face of our internship program with the Host Training Establishments.”
Dacanay looks to use the challenges brought the pandemic as a chance to “rethink, reinvent, and reinvigorate [pharmacy] programs.” To this end, she said that the panel aims to provide guidance by “[exploring] new approaches, most especially in delivering our specialized lab courses and experiential learning.”
Beyond the bachelor’s level, Dacanay said the panel will also look at reforms in the Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD), Master’s and doctorate levels as well as revisit the “alignment and contributions of the programs in terms of public health, research, and internationalization.” Under Dacanay’s term, UST opened the PharmD program, which has been heavy on international linkages, specifically with the University of Illinois Chicago.
According to the Commission on Higher Education, those appointed to the Technical Panel shall serve a term of four years and “are expected to assist the Commission in providing technical expertise, particularly in the development of disciplinal and degree program roadmaps; review, revision and updating of PSGs based on the policy direction set by the Commission and consistent with local, regional, and international needs and industry trends; develop or revise Policies and Guidelines on Centers of Excellence and Centers or Development (COE/COD) for the various disciplines and in the crafting of monitoring and evaluation instruments and systems, as well as orientation of technical evaluators, among others.”
