[New post] Ex-DOST Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña Shows There’s Life after Being Fulltime Government Servant
edd1994 posted: " EXCLUSIVE TO SDN -- SciTech and Digital News Short link: https://wp.me/paaccn-uUb (SDN) -- Some might be asking what happens to public servants who are used to heavy workloads and big responsibilities in his or her area of work when they retire. Ca" SDN -- Science & Digital News
(SDN) -- Some might be asking what happens to public servants who are used to heavy workloads and big responsibilities in his or her area of work when they retire.
Case in point, engineer Fortunato T. de la Peña served the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) for 24 years although spread over 40 years since his permanent position was really as a professor of Industrial Engineering at the College of Engineering at the University of the Philippines (UP CE) Diliman, Quezon City, Metro Manila, where he taught for 43 years from 1973 to 2016.
The former DOST Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña, the brains behind many of DOST's life-changing programs, projects, and services as he and other officials have been bringing science closer to the Filipino people. (Photo credit: SDN -- Science and Digital News)
He was seconded by UP to DOST four times and he was taken from his first retirement in 2016 to serve in the Cabinet of President Rodrigo R. Duterte for a full six years from June 30, 2016, to June 30, 2022, as head of the DOST.
How did the simultaneous service to two big government institutions happen?
This was possible because he did not stop teaching at UP even when he was doing a fulltime job at DOST.
He taught graduate courses in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research and also Technology Management while serving DOST full time except during the two years after compulsory retirement in 2014 before he was appointed DOST Secretary in 2016.
So, how is de la Peña now? Is there life after serving as fulltime public servant?
Obviously, there is!
Let's hear it straight from, so to speak, the horse's mouth.
I am still loaded with work now even if I am already out of my responsibilities of running a government department. But I do enjoy my being busy still.
I am a consultant at the DOST Science Education Institute or SEI, particularly in expanding the reach of graduate STEM Scholarships by evaluating graduate STEM programs in different parts of the country to see if these can be included in the available DOST scholarship listing. (STEM is Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.)
I serve as a Faculty in Charge for Capstone Projects in a batch of Masters in Development Management (Ms DM) students at the Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP) -- 45 students in this batch.
I am again helping a state university, the Rizal Technological University or RTU with two campuses in the cities of Mandaluyong and Pasig, in research and innovation institutional capability development.
I had served RTU as regent for 14 years during my years as DOST Undersecretary and I see its potentials towards serving as a key medium in pushing industrial development and in helping uplift the conditions of poor families in the Rizal and Metro Manila areas through a good tertiary education for their children.
In the private sector I now serve through the following:
- as a member of the Board of Trustees of De La Salle University.
- as an Independent Director in the Board of Directors of Maynilad.
- as Chairman of the Board of Automated Technologies Corporation or ATEC. It is a semiconductor & electronics firm established by my cousin Renato Tanseco in 1995 located at the Light Industry & Science Park in Cabuyao, Laguna.
- I am also an Independent Director of AMH Engineering Corporation with offices at the UP Bahay ng Alumni which was established 24 years ago.
- I also serve in the Board of Directors of Industrial Controls Corp., a 34-year-old industrial automation company which I helped nurture as a technology start up in the UP Diliman Technology Business Incubator in the early 90's.
Outside of government and the business sector I also serve in the following capacities:
- As Chairman of the Board of the Philippine Foundation for Science & Technology or PFST, succeeding its long time Chair, the Late Filemon "Jun" Berba who passed away last April.
- As Chairman of the Board of Entrepinoy Volunteers Foundation, Inc. or EVFI, which helps micro and small Filipino entrepreneurs through the services of volunteer executives.
- As Chairman of the Board of Kabesera, Inc., the heritage association of the town of Bulakan, Bulacan, where I was born and brought up. As most of us are aware the new international airport being built by San Miguel Corp. (SMC) is located in this historic town.
We have to see to it that its cultural heritage in its different forms (are preserved).
As I said I am still busy, and I am happy about it.
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