To the Batch Magdarani, Class of 2026 of the College of Social Sciences and Humanities, to your families whose support has been constant yet often unspoken, to the faculty and staff who have shaped your academic formation, and to the wider MSU–General Santos community, it is with profound pride that I join you in this academic milestone and extend my heartfelt greetings. This occasion marks not only the completion of a degree, but the quiet consolidation of years lived through uncertainty, adjustment, and unwavering purpose.

Your academic journey began in a period of recovery—when higher education returned to full face-to-face learning after prolonged years of disruption. Many of you entered MSU-GenSan having experienced an incomplete or virtual Senior High School graduation. Over the years that followed, your formation unfolded alongside broader institutional realities, including the recent magnitude 7.8 earthquake that struck the University and greatly tested its resilience. Yet within these conditions, continuity was sustained not by absence of disruption, but by the steady effort to proceed within it. Learning did not cease; it adapted, persisted, and advanced.

The world into which you now graduate is defined less by stability than by acceleration and complexity. Artificial intelligence and digital systems are reshaping professional practice, decision-making, and workplace structures across industries. Economic conditions remain volatile within an interconnected yet uncertain global system, shaped increasingly by environmental pressures and evolving expectations of public accountability. Information now moves with immediacy and volume, while discernment has become as essential as access. In such a context, competence alone is no longer sufficient. Judgment, adaptability, and ethical grounding have become essential professional conditions.

Within the disciplines of social sciences and humanities, these realities carry particular weight. Human societies are shaped not only by systems and institutions, but by language, memory, culture, governance, and the constant negotiation of meaning and power. The status quo is marked by widening social visibility and increasing polarization in public discourse, where disagreement is often immediate, amplified, and complex in its consequences. For students of literature, linguistics, history, sociology, political science, and psychology, this responsibility extends into the broader work of understanding social complexity, engaging public life, and contributing to the formation of more just and humane communities. As graduates of this College, you are called to engage these spaces not as passive observers, but as active critical thinkers who bring perspective, responsibility, and intellectual integrity into public life. Professional excellence in the social sciences and humanities is measured not only by what is analyzed, but by how deeply human reality is understood and responsibly engaged.

As you receive your academic degrees, you do so as members of a university that has sought to form individuals capable of navigating complexity without surrendering principle. The values of integrity, respect, inclusivity, service, and excellence are not presented as declarations, but as expectations made visible through conduct and engagement with others, guided by a continuing responsibility toward sustainable peace and development in Mindanao. In time, what will distinguish your work will not only be what you achieved, but how you chose to achieve it—the principles you chose to uphold when they were most tested, and the responsibilities you were willing to carry along the way.

Congratulations, Batch Magdarani, Class of 2026.

ATTY. SHIDIK T. ABANTAS, MDM, LLM 

Chancellor 

Greetings of Peace and Solidarity!

I extend my heartfelt congratulations to the graduating class of the College of Social Sciences and Humanities of MSU General Santos.

Today marks the culmination of years of discipline, perseverance, and rigorous academic preparation in the fields of social sciences, humanities, and human studies. As you leave the University, you carry not only academic competence and critical insight but also the responsibility to understand, engage, and respond to the complexities of human society with wisdom, empathy, and integrity.

My sincere appreciation goes to the faculty, whose commitment to academic excellence has shaped this generation of graduates, and to the parents and families whose sacrifices and steadfast support have made this achievement possible.

As your Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, I am confident that you will uphold the ideals of MSU General Santos and the enduring values of critical scholarship and social responsibility. Continue to embody IRISE—Inclusivity, Respect for Others, Integrity, Service to People, and Excellence. Let these values guide your perspectives, decisions, and service to communities.

Congratulations, Class of 2026. May you contribute meaningfully to a society shaped by understanding, compassion, justice, and informed action.

DR. MISHELL D. LAWAS, PECE, ASEAN Eng 

Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs 

Today, we celebrate a defining milestone in your journey as scholars, leaders, and active citizens. As you prepare to leave the halls of the College of Social Sciences and Humanities, we honor not only your academic accomplishments but also the character, resilience, and compassion that have shaped you into true Vanguards.

Your graduating class will be remembered not only for completing your studies but also for persevering through extraordinary challenges. This year, our communities were shaken by powerful earthquakes that disrupted lives, damaged homes, and tested our collective resolve. Yet amid uncertainty and hardship, many of you stepped forward to serve. You volunteered in relief operations, participated in humanitarian initiatives, provided psychosocial support, mobilized resources, and stood in solidarity with affected families and communities. In moments when people needed help the most, you demonstrated that education is not merely about acquiring knowledge—it is about responding to human suffering with empathy and action.

These experiences affirmed what it truly means to be a Vanguard. A Vanguard is one who thinks critically amidst complexity, empathizes with the struggles and aspirations of others, and actively participates in building a more just, peaceful, and humane society. Throughout your years at Mindanao State University–General Santos City, you have been challenged not only to understand the world but also to engage it with courage, responsibility, and purpose.

As you enter the world of professional practice, you will encounter rapid technological change, social uncertainties, and evolving global realities. Yet amidst these transformations, the enduring challenge remains the same: to humanize the world and make your knowledge relevant to the needs of people and communities. Your degrees are not merely credentials for employment; they are instruments for service, transformation, and social responsibility.

Carry with you the lessons learned both inside and outside the classroom. Let the resilience you displayed during times of crisis remind you that leadership is measured not only by achievement but also by service. Let your voices speak for those who are unheard. Let your work contribute to peace, development, social justice, and human dignity. Above all, remain faithful to the values that define a CSSH Vanguard— compassion, critical thinking, integrity, and active citizenship.

On behalf of the faculty, staff, alumni, and the entire College of Social Sciences and Humanities family, I extend my warmest congratulations. May you continue to learn, serve, and lead with courage and humility wherever life takes you.

The future awaits your contribution. Go forth as Vanguards of hope, justice, and humanity.

Congratulations, Class of 2026!

"Basta Vanguard, Kusog!"

DR. MARIO JOYO AGUJA 

College Dean 

Eliseo F. Huesca, Jr. is a Professor IV and the Vice President for Research, Extension, and Production at Davao del Norte State College, Philippines. His work sits at the intersection of peace and security, development, and policy studies. Dr. Huesca earned his PhD from the Universiti Brunei Darussalam as a full scholar. While in Brunei, he was selected for the Asian Graduate Research Fellowship at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore. He completed his master's degree at the International Christian University, Japan, as a JDS Fellow, and held brief fellowships at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, and the United Nations University in Yokohama, Japan. As an active scholar, he has presented research papers across Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong, Brunei, Malaysia, and Singapore. Dr. Huesca is a proud alumnus of History Department, MSU-GenSan; and the Davao Medical School Foundation where he finished his Master in Participatory Development.

As an academic leader, he has successfully led university partnership missions in Japan and Malaysia, including student and faculty exchanges and scholarly partnerships with Hiroshima University, Rikkyo University, and the International Islamic University Malaysia. Furthermore, he has directed the execution of more than five international research conferences and conventions, attracting participants from across the Philippines, Asia, and the USA. He also spearheaded the establishment of seven RDE Centers and two institutional journals. Currently, he serves as the program leader for a two-year project funded by the DOST-NRCP, alongside several other initiatives in the pipeline, while actively positioning Davao del Norte State College as a national trailblazer in two RDE niches: human security studies and the halal industry, specifically halal aquaculture.

To the Batch Magdarani,

We have endured so much, often calling ourselves “the pandemic babies,” as if that name could ever fully contain what we have lived through. Adversity did not merely pass by us, it lingered, quiet but constant, shaping the way we breathe through uncertainty and how we continue to move even when certainty was never promised. We entered college not as fully armed warriors, but as fragile beginnings stepping into a battlefield we were never truly prepared for. And yet, we came anyway.

We carried no armor, only small and trembling hopes, like fireflies scattered in a vast, unlit field. Each of us flickered in our own silence, sometimes bright, sometimes fading, but never truly gone. Even in our distance from one another, we were never without light. We learned slowly that survival is not only about enduring darkness, but about continuing to glow within it.

There were nights when we questioned our worth, mornings when exhaustion felt heavier than ambition, and moments when giving up seemed easier than continuing. Yet in all these, we were quietly reshaping something, not just our futures, but the lives we touch simply by continuing to exist and persist.

As Victor Hugo once wrote in Les Misérables, “Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.” And so we rose with it, not because the darkness disappeared, but because we learned how to carry light within it.

We did not simply pass through college, we flickered through it like fireflies in motion, reshaping lives not through permanence, but through the quiet courage of continuing to shine, even when the world did not promise us light.

Congratulations, Batch Magdarani!

MELDEN DAVE CASING 

CSSHSO President