RCTQ welcomes new senior managers
Because RCTQ’s work has been expanding, it is beefing up its human resource by welcoming three academics as full-time senior program managers.
Let us meet them individually.
Dr. Levi E. Elipane is an associate professor at the College of Graduate Studies and Teacher Education Research (CGSTER) of the Philippine Normal University (PNU). He was also an associate professorial lecturer at the Brother Andrew Gonzales College of Education of De La Salle University (DLSU) in Manila. For the past six years into the academe, Dr. Elipane has collaborated with his students and some colleagues from different schools and universities to embark on Lesson Study as a form of research and professional development initiative.
In 2012, Dr. Elipane obtained his PhD in Mathematics Education from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. He took his master’s degree at Saitama University in Japan, and his undergraduate degree at the University of the Philippines in Diliman.
Dr. Elipane has been invited as a plenary speaker in various seminars and conferences in different parts of the Philippines and in many countries. Moreover, he was also granted Student Wings of Excellence (Leaders of Tomorrow) Award in Switzerland in 2008 for the St. Gallen Symposium.
He started working with RCTQ on 16 March 2020 focusing on the National Educators Academy of the Philippines (NEAP) Career Advancement Program (CAPRO) and later the Teacher Induction Program (TIP).
“Working with RCTQ will definitely allow me to do what I really love doing—and that is working on teacher professional development. I will have the chance to know the realities on the ground and be able take part in creating policies that would make a great impact on our teachers,” Dr. Elipane said.
Dr. Allen A Espinosa completed his PhD on full scholarship at the University of Melbourne Australia, where he investigated the impact of prior knowledge, and confidence in prior knowledge, to the degree of conceptual change learning. He developed an active learning tutorial in biochemistry and molecular biology that fosters conceptual change in a large class setting by capitalizing on confusion and surprise generated by misconceptions.
Dr. Espinosa has also done substantial research in teaching and teacher education with a focus on science education. His studies on a broad range of topics on content and pedagogy have appeared in journals such as the Australian Educational Researcher, Australian Journal of Teacher Education, Australian Journal of Environmental Education, Issues in Educational Research, and the Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching among others. He also contributes to the magazine Teaching Science, the flagship journal of the Australian Science Teachers Association. He is a member of the editorial board of the top-ranked journal Research in Science Education (IF 1.741). See full list of Dr. Espinosa’s publications at Google Scholar and ResearchGate.
Dr. Espinosa was a recipient of the 2017 University of Melbourne Medicine, Dentistry, and Health Sciences Award for Learning and Teaching Achievement, the 2019 European Science Education Research Association Research Fellowship Award, and the 2019 Philippine Normal University Research Citation Award.
Dr. Espinosa will be working on two major projects: Further Embedding of Leadership Standards in DepEd Result-based Performance Management System (RPMS), and the Assessors Program.
“I am thrilled to be part of a dynamic team of researchers at RCTQ and I look forward to contributing to the upscaling of teacher quality in the Philippines,” he remarked.
Dr. Espinosa joined RCTQ on 16 March 2020.
Dr. Ma. Arsenia C. Gomez has been in the teaching profession for 20 years starting as a Junior High School Social Studies and Filipino Teacher. In 2012, she started teaching at PNU and became a full-time faculty member of the then newly organized Faculty of Behavioral and Social Sciences (FBeSS) a year later.
Dr. Gomez studied MA in Asian Studies at the University of the Philippines Diliman and graduated with a political science/international relations college degree at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP). In 2004-2005, she studied Chinese language and culture at Ming Chuan University as Taiwan’s Ministry of Education scholar. Further training and travels overseas have helped her become an advocate of multicultural education especially focused on the plight of Muslim Filipinos. This advocacy became the subject of her dissertation study leading her to finish a Doctorate in Social Studies Education in September 2019 from Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia (Indonesia University of Education).
In her two decades in the teaching profession, she has authored Social Studies learning modules and textbook. A passionate traveler in her younger days, her travel articles and commentaries were published in Philippines and Malaysia. At present, aside from teaching, her academic life revolves around conducting training for teachers.
