Minutes of April 14, 1999 meeting held at Manila Polo Club,

Report by Gabby Consulta, Chairman:

Hi. I hope everything is well with you as well as the rest of our batchmates in the US. First of all, my congratulations to the new officers of the USA Chapter of SBC Batch 75, led by Joji. All the E-mail exchanges reflect how eager you are all to help out in some way. Let me outline our objectives, as well as the key activities that we want to accomplish between now and 19 Feb. 2000, all of which was discussed and validated at last night's SBCHS75 Board of Trustees meeting at Manila Polo Club, attended by Rey Umali, Benji Parungo, Bebet Gaudinez, Jito Arreza, Boy Masakayan, Jess Gonzales, Ipe Sanvictores, Bong Desales, Allah Arroyo, Andy Hirang, Ira Maniquis, Ernie Ting (plus a guest from Batch 74 Allen Mercado who shared his experiences) and myself.

Our goals are : to come up with a highly memorable and successful Millenium Homecoming event; to reinforce the bonding amongst Batch 75 members; to be able to give something back to our Alma Mater San Beda. I will come back to this last point shortly.

Operations-wise, there are really two focal points in the run-up to 19 Feb 2000: first is the Homecoming event itself, and second, the fundraising events prior to the Homecoming.

Jess Gonzales and the members of the Ways and Means Committee presented last night a laundry list of possible fundraising events as well as "fun"/fellowship events (close to 15 in total). The whole group deliberated last night and agreed that between April 99 and Feb 2000 (10 months in total, 9 if you consider that December we will hardly meet) we cannot accomplish all of them, many of them good ideas notwithstanding. We therefore agreed to narrow our fundraising events to three, as follows:

1. Movie Premier to be held July 1999

2. Golf Tournament to be held October 1999

3. Music Concert to be held 14 February 2000

Ira Maniquis will chair the Movie Premier Committee; Andy Hirang and Jojo Ocampo the Golf Committee; and Bong Desales the Music Concert Committee. Each of them are tasked to draw up, plan, and then present on our 30 April General Membership meeting the mechanics as well as an idea of projected revenues and expenses for each of these 3 events. The Music Concert was especially chosen to fall on Valentine's Day, as most of us go out anyway with our partner on that day (so why not spend it together as a Batch); Monday 14 Feb will also be the start of a build up of activities leading up to the actual Homecoming on 19 Feb; The Homecoming will really be an all-male affair, so the 14 Feb concert gives us a venue to bring our spouses/partners and get them to know each other; and 14 Feb also allows Batch 75 USA Chapter to have at least one more activity apart from the Homecoming proper, to make maximum use of their cross-Pacific trip to Manila.

There is actually a fourth fundraising activity, and that is a classdirectory cum yearbook where we will make money from the advertising inserts. This will be an ongoing activity from day one and is not really considered an event, but a worthwhile funraiser nonetheless. The three fundraising events above, plus the yearbook, will require a lot of blood,sweat and tears from everyone. We believe these are achievable, though challenging, given the short 9-to-10 month period left to do everything.

The Homecoming Event itself--- event chairman and committee heads and actual program---- will still be deliberated and sorted out by the next meeting.

Finally, we reviewed the fund target which, in our previous meeting, we set at 2 million pesos, and agreed on an upward revision. We reviewed together last night the possible projects to channel the funds we will raise, and narrowed it down to the following:

1. Educational scholarships

2. Fr Ed/Bukidnon

3. Contribution to the SBC Alumni Association

4. Physical Structure Improvement at SBC Mendiola

Point no. 4 can be funding a good, well-equipped computer room at SBC HS or GS (suggested well by Ipe), or renovating the basketball courts which really appear rundown--- something which will be physically present, and enshrine our active and dedicated participation to the physical improvement of our Alma Mater. We will firm up the details, as well as the suggested breakdown of the amounts to be donated to the 4 projects.

We have agreed to up our fund objective to 3 million pesos: 2 million to be generated by the Manila chapter, and 1 million pesos ($25,000) by the USA Chapter. These are net amounts, after expenses, so that the activities will have to generate or gross more than that. We know it is a stretch target for all of us, but we believe we have to be more aggressive(being the YK 2000 bearers), and we really have to challenge ourselves and see how far we can go.

To achieve your 1 million pesos, you will have to conduct your own fundraising events, similar to what we are doing here. Gentlemen, this will be a lot of work for all of us. But as we toil and sweat, let us not lose sight of what we are doing this for: it is not for all of us individually, but it is really to help others, to support a community, and as many of you have said, to give back to our Alma Mater as we have been also molded by it more than 30 years ago. I have been skeptical about being an active member of Batch 75, because my job requires 12 to 14 hours of work everyday plus certain weekends, and I have 4 growing children to bring up. But I have taken up this challenge, being motivated solely by the desire to help.

I will be leaving for the USA/Canada on 04 May, and will be in L.A. 19 to 22 May. I hope we could all get together either on 20 or 21 May, to meet up with you, and also to discuss the above issues in greater detail. Look forward to seeing and hearing you all soon. Regards.

Gabby