URSB's ‘Le Pilier’ bags 39th CMMA’s Best Student Organ College Award

by John Carlo Borja

The concept of bringing Philippines to its serious medication, praying for its immediate healing and pleading for God’s miracle brought home the Best Student Organ College Award for Le Pilier in the 39th Catholic Mass Media Awards (CMMA) Night held at Star Theatre, Pasay City. Le Pilier, is crafted by The Pillar Publication, and is the official magazine of University of Rizal System Binangonan. The said output revolved its stories on how Philippines can navigate its flood of change through the arms of future influencers who are calling for healthier, purposive, unbiased, upright, and faithful change. “Our country is in a high-speed of palpitation. We need to save our nation’s dying soul and revive its sanctity and nobility. This is what we saw and intended to share to others when we crafted Le Pilier,” Ber Dela Cruz, former The Pillar editor-in-chief explained. It was the second nomination of the said output in the country’s most prestigious awards-giving body and is the first recognition the university has received from the CMMA. In addition, Speculum, the official literary folio of URSB, was selected as finalist in the Best Literary Publication category. Le Pilier bested six other finalists coming from 18 entries for the said category. Other outputs came from Ateneo de Manila University, De La Salle Lipa, Batangas State University and Lyceum of the Philippines University Batangas. Anchoring on this year’s CMMA theme, “Communicating hope and trust in our time,” Honorary Chairman and Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle encouraged every heart to be filled with hope and to search for stories of hope. Communicating hope and trust, he said, could only be done by “hoping and trusting,” which goes the same mantra that one could communicate love “only by loving.” “Let our hearts say, ‘Yes to hope and Yes to Trust.’ We must hope more when there is no point of hoping. We must trust even when we lose the point of trusting,” Cardinal Tagle ended. Among 730 entries nationwide from the various fields of mass media including print, television, radio, advertising, music, cinema, online media and the student CMMA, only 281 made it to the finds, 228 from professionals and 53 from student media workers.