IE Achievers Program Off to a Roaring Start, Momentum to be Sustained

The pledges for donations kept on coming. At least that’s how it seemed like to the attendees of the UPIEAA 2016 homecoming last October 22 at the Maynilad Room on the third floor where the event was held. Over P800,000 was pledged at homecoming night, facilitated by the slick persuasive skills of emcee Dante Briones who set the tone by pledging P60,000 care of his graduating class 82 NAKS barkada which included Mon Jocson and Noel Tempongko.

Other pledges that evening included P30,000 from director Joy Yap and alumni daughter; Jajo (IE82) and Chicky Quintos (IE83), through ‘emissary’ Ricky Banaag, who pledge P120,000; Malou Esguerra who pledged P60,000 through her company HERMA Group; Cilla Sugay who pledged P60,000 together with her ‘Happy Hour’ IE 82 gang; Josie Banaag-de Leon and Jeng Pascual who pledged P100,000 on behalf of their Batch 86 barkada; Edwin Reyes who pledged P60,000 on behalf of his IE 81 friends; Lowell Lorenzo, Maribel Cusi-San Jose and Jeff de Leon and their Batch 83 barkada, for P80,000.

But the biggest pledge belonged to Batch 84-85, with Karl Riego, Kenny Bulahan, and Liza Ting bravely committing to P240,000!

In addition to those pledged at homecoming night, there were early donations, based on cold calls to alumni ‘friends’ of the board. Annie Dee (IE77) of Teresa Marble was one of the first donors, sending a P60,000 check to the UPIEAA office. Also sending early money UPIEAA’s way were Gilbert Ong (IE79) for P5,000 and Timothy Go (IE06) for P10,000. Three anonymous donors contributed a total of P55,000. Other individual contributors included Francis Quevedo (IE83) for P10,000, Richard Kong (IE83) for P10,000, and Gerard Doctora (IE87) for P10,000.

As of April 2017, only P100,000 of the total pledges received remain to be collected. Bravo to all the IE barkadas, social gangs, and individual alums.

For the next round, the UPIEAA board is now setting its sights on large corporate donors, with the initiative to be spearheaded by no less than the UPIEAA president himself, Ricky Banaag.