CEU president wins Juran Medal Award for promoting quality and excellence
Centro Escolar University (CEU) president Dr. Ma. Cristina Padolina is this year’s recipient of the Juran Medal Award for her achievements in promoting quality and excellence.
Padolina – along with key officials and notable alumni of the CEU – attended the awarding ceremony held at Okada Manila late Monday evening.
“I am very happy for CEU,” Padolina said in an interview
with the Manila Bulletin prior to the awarding rites. “I’m really receiving this for CEU because this is not just about my work… it’s really the work of the entire university that is being awarded,” she added.
The Juran Medal is awarded by the Philippine Society for Quality (PSQ), Inc. to a “senior executive of companies, the academe, labor organization for his/her significant contribution in the field of quality management in the Philippines.”
In her acceptance speech, Padolina thanked the entire CEU community for their efforts and tireless devotion. “Our approach to bringing out quality in our institution is described by the statement: ‘It takes a community to achieve quality’.”
“As I read about the contributions of Dr. Joseph Juran to the advancement of quality management in organizations, I was happy to know that he, in fact, is recognized for having shifted the focus on the quality of the end product to the focus on human dimension of quality management,” Padolina said.
This award, Padolina added, serves as recognition of the “collective effort” of the entire CEU community to “promote and practice quality in our organization.” Paragon of quality and excellence
As CEU’s president for 11 years, Padolina has always been considered as a “paragon of quality and excellence” for continuously pursuing vigorous systems approach for institutional transformation.
Under Padolina’s leadership, she steered the CEU in defining its “organizational direction and the principles and core values to guide personnel behavior and institutional actions.” She also “harnessed the strengths and talents of the constituents of the University in order to fulfill its vision and realize its mission.”
Padolina brought to her leadership in CEU her knowledge and understanding of higher education from her schooling in various universities where she obtained her undergraduate and graduate degrees, her experience as faculty of the University of the Philippines-Los Baños and as the first chancellor of the University of the Philippines Open University and from perspectives gleaned from having been a commissioner of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED).
This wide experience – as well as her science background – instilled in her an “open-minded attitude in institutional governance and an ability to synthesize wide-ranging ideas and views to arrive at what is applicable and relevant to CEU.”
Under Padolina’s governance, CEU has sustained the “strength of the institution and the maintenance of quality principles, policies and processes.”
This resulted in quality awards received by CEU which includes: international certification of six (6) programs by the ASEAN University Network-Quality Assurance (AUN-QA); PACUCOA accreditation/re-accreditation of 14 programs to Level IV, the highest level given to a program; certification of the CEU Quality Management System under the ISO 9001:2015; renewal of Autonomous Status of CEU Manila and CEU Malolos; submission to the CHED Institutional Sustainability Assessment of CEU Makati and CEU Malolos; renewal of Center of Excellence (COE) in Teacher Education program and Center of Development (COD) for the Business Administration program; award of Center of Development (COD) status to the Optometry program, and the sterling performance of CEU graduates in PRC licensure examinations and the Bar examination.
A firm and passionate advocate of the CEU’s University’s philosophy, “Science and Virtue,” Padolina believes that this is also “the primary guiding principle for the university’s pursuit of quality assurance.”
Padolina is also known for her advocacy and commitment to empowering employees and instilling quality and excellence among the CEU workforce that led to the conceptualization and implementation of CEU’s Quality People Quality University (QPQU) program which focuses on three components: continuous learning program, process improvement and innovation, and Unity and Teamwork.
Among the criteria in choosing the Juran Medal Awardee include: championing and practicing quality for at least 5 years; has a missionary spirit in promoting the ideas parallel to those of Dr. Joseph Juran; has influenced the direction of a major organization in promoting quality; and can show positive results in his organization.
Among the past awardees include Lyceum of the Philippines UniversityBatangas and Laguna president Dr. Peter P. Laurel, The Medical City president and CEO Dr. Alfredo Bengzon, Seameo Innotech director Dr. Ramon Bacani, PJ Lhuillier, Inc. (PJLI) president and CEO Jean Henri Lhuillier, and Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities Commission on Accreditation chairman Rosita Navarro, among others.
The PSQ is a non-stock, nonprofit organization and had been laying down the groundwork for setting up a quality organization that can serve as a catalyst for action in the application of quality management.
It is affiliated with the American Society for Quality (ASQ), Global Benchmarking Network (GBN), Asia Pacific Quality Organization (APQO), Philippine Quality Award (PQA) of Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP), University of the Philippines Institute for Small-Scale Industries, and Quality and Productivity Association of the Philippines (QPAP), Inc.