Impulses

By Herman M. Lagon Teaching did not suddenly become difficult in 2026. It has been quietly heavy for years, but this year feels different because the weight is finally being named. The posts circulating on social media about what teachers must avoid struck a nerve, not because they were radical, but because they sounded familiar. …

By HERMAN M. LAGON The news spread quickly, as it often does now. A technical decision by the United States Department of Education — framed in regulatory language about loan categories — suddenly felt personal to many nurses. Nursing, long grouped with medicine and law for federal student loan purposes, was removed from the list …

By Herman M. Lagon The chart is blunt. You do not even need to read the footnotes to feel uneasy. Provinces with the highest share of what scholars call fat political dynasties are also places where poverty, weak institutions and fragile public services have long felt familiar. The bars stretch longer where hope often feels …

By Herman M. Lagon Let us begin with a confession: Once, while trying to decode what my students meant when they said something was “mid,” I found myself scrolling through Facebook with a furrowed brow and a browser history full of Urban Dictionary tabs. Somewhere between “cap,” “no cap” and “cringe,” I realized I was …

By Herman M. Lagon Election season in the Philippines has a familiar rhythm. Tarpaulins rise before the rain clouds do, surnames grow larger than platforms, and campaign jingles recycle promises that sound generous but feel oddly hollow. In many provinces, the choices look different only on paper. The same families rotate seats, swap positions and …

By Herman M. Lagon The question sounds simple: Who was the first Filipino? The quick reply is a name. The steady reply is a map. Ask a classroom full of teachers and students, and 10 answers will surface — Lapu-Lapu, José Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, a Negrito ancestor, even a fossil from a cave. None is …

By Herman M. Lagon Sometimes it comes quietly — not with announcements or goodbyes, but with the ordinary weight of a moment. A daughter comes home unexpectedly two weeks before Christmas, sits across the table as herself, and you realize the child you once held no longer needs holding — just as she prepares to …

By Herman M. Lagon Something has been silently growing underneath for a while now, and it would rather not be ignored anymore. You can see it on the streets and on your phone, in handwritten signs and shared symbols, and in young voices that seem more tired than angry. What many people term the Gen …

By Herman M. Lagon Try a small exercise. The next time someone with a title — director, colonel, president, CEO, doctor, attorney, chairperson, mayor, congressman — tells you, “Share this, it is official,” pause. Ask, “How do we know?” That pause is where truth often survives. Albert Einstein once warned that blind obedience to authority …

By Herman M. Lagon The images that stay with us in Philippine basketball are usually loud — arms raised, crowds shaking arenas, emotions spilling over. This time, gold arrived without theatrics. In Bangkok, it came through subtraction: fewer stars, fewer assurances, fewer breaks. What remained was a group that trusted one another, anchored by a …