The year was 1999.

Ateneo Human Rights Center (AHRC) of the Ateneo de Manila University (AdMU) invited Ateneo de Davao University (AdDU) College of Law to send two law students for its Summer Internship Program. Since AHRC’s establishment in 1987, it was the first time for AdDU to participate in the AHRC’s program.

AdDU sent Atty. Jennifer “Jenny” Ramos and Atty. Dexter “Dex” Lopoz (when they were still in their third year in law school) to participate in the said internship program. Jenny and Dex joined many other interns from various law schools in the country. They attended a Basic Orientation Seminar (BOS), get involved in the Community Immersion Program in Mindoro and undertook the Internship proper. Jenny was assigned to Environmental Legal Assistance Center (ELAC), Cebu, joined the same in advocating and doing paralegal works for environmental protection.

THE CAMPAIGN

By the first semester of the school year 1999–2000, Jenny and Dex, through the encouragement of Judge Marivic Daray, herself a member of the first group of AHRC interns during her law school days at AdMU and currently, AdDLAW’s faculty adviser, began a tedious room to room campaign. They shared their experiences as interns and urged law students to join the Internship program. Jenny and Judge Daray envisioned setting up a law student group undertaking the same program – one that focuses on human rights or public interest and is definitely service-oriented and student-based.

THE AdDLAW WAVE

Jen and Dex’s efforts were not for naught; the campaign yielded around twenty (20) students from all levels. They were to constitute the so-called CORE GROUP. Atty. Carlos Medina, Executive Director of AHRC, met the core group to discuss the possibility and feasibility of setting up a similar center which will provide a supplemental internship program for the law students. The initial funding for the said program came from AHRC. Said fund would stand to exist until the group is equipped to finance and map its own programs and activities in line with the ultimate Ateneo principle of being “Men for others”.

On November 28-29, 1999, at the Felis Beach Resort, the CORE GROUP formed and conceptualized AdDLAW (Ateneo de Davao Legal Advocacy Works). There were two means of achieving the goal. The first was to seek the university and the College of Law’s recognition of AdDLAW as a center that is linked with the AdDU Legal Aid Office, a unit that is part of the university system, such as in the case of XUCLA (Xavier University Center for Legal Aid) of the Xavier University of Cagayan de Oro. The second was to operate and establish it as a university recognized student organization. Given the circumstances obtaining, then Core Group opted for the second alternative.

The plan was to go directly into organizing the internal make-up of the organization, its vision and programs, to seek the approval and recognition of the university and College of Law, and to eventually implement a Summer Internship Program. As it turned out, the program was implemented and the group operated as an organization without any formal university or college recognition yet. Nevertheless, the activities were conducted with or without the knowledge and tacit support from the College of Law.

PAGBUBUO

As its initial project, AdDLAW launched its major step – the Pagbubuo, a local internship program conducted last May 3-12, 2000. AHRC sent Genevieve Yu and Raymond Salas, two interns from the Ateneo de Manila and Atty. Glenda Ramirez, a resident lawyer of the Center, to facilitate the Basic Orientation Seminar (BOS) , the Community Immersion Program  and the Evaluation.

Lawyer-lecturers from Davao, Cebu and Manila attended the BOS. The speakers are held to be prominent in the fields of labor, women, children, agrarian reform, environment, indigenous peoples, and human rights. Majority of them were members of the Alternative Law Groups (ALG), a national group of alternative lawyers. So fueled by the success and camaraderie brought by the BOS, AdDLAW pursued the weeklong Immersion in the far-flung barangays of Calinan despite the turmoil in Mindanao. The happenings served as a test for the members’ commitment as an organization. True to what it sought to achieve, a vision was pieced together by common experiences and cause, a true depiction of a process called PAGBUBUO.

On the first day, the said activity focused on making a BLOG, the basic purpose of a blog, and the impact of blogging to the present modern world, whom is effectively told to us by MR. ROBILLO, A.K.A. BLOGIE.

On the second day, our activity was on News gathering and writing. The speaker, Madam D.Y., give emphasis that in making a news, one should wrote according to what interest him/her and always believing in your craft without sacrificing the ethics to be observed in making the same.

LABAN ng KABATAAN(LMK) of Digos City, UNYPHIL from Mati City, are the youth organizations who also participated the said seminar.

Nonetheless, what may be the group out put of each participant in applying our knowledge in BLOGGING and NEWS writing, it just boils down to one goal, and that it to achieve a JUST, EQUAL and HUMANE SOCIETY THAT EVERY HUMAN BEING DREAMED OF.