One mention of her surname and most people in De La Salle University-Dasmariñas already knows who you’re talking about.
Since I was a freshman, I’ve heard the name “Sarile” everywhere on campus, even from people outside of our department. When her name gets mentioned, it’s always accompanied with a tone of recognition or a comment of praise.
The reputation this woman has must always be adorned with such compliments — so it’s no surprise how Rosanni “Ahnnie” Sarile is so recognizable with her patterned clothes and dangly earrings. She walks the hallways of the Julian Felipe Hall with her chin up and a big smile on her face, even if it’s so early in the morning.
My heart-to-heart talk with Ma’am Ahnnie started later than planned because before she could even get into the office, people greeted her everywhere. Her fellow professors made small talk with her, third-year students were waiting for a consultation for their thesis, and even an alumnus who was there to visit as a surprise.
After she caught up with different people outside, Ma’am Ahnnie sank into the couch beside me inside the Communication and Journalism Department office.
And right there, she told me about her legacy.
A Caviteño child with a dream
You see, despite how her presence has left a big mark on many people inside and outside the campus, the prestige in the Sarile name wasn’t there at first, especially during the beginnings of her childhood.
Ma’am Ahnnie grew up in the coastal town of Kawit, Cavite with a fisherman for a father and a mother who ironed clothes for a living.
Back then, she would wake up at four o’clock in the morning as she and her three ates leave their nipa hut house and walk all the way to their boat to help with the catch for the day or what is called pamamalakaya.
During that time, she would walk all the way to their school and back because she didn’t have any money to even ride a jeepney.
Even so, she grew up with a joyful childhood, raised as a church girl who always joined rosary readings so she could get free snacks.
“Masaya ang childhood days [ko] kasi merong karakol. Sumasama kami […] at doon ako nangarap na maging teacher,” she said with a wistful smile.
(My childhood days were joyful because we would join this dance festival called karakol. And that’s where my dream to become a teacher started.)
For Ma’am Ahnnie, karakol is a sacred dance for healing and gratitude. It was also a way to grant your deepest wishes. Her mother wished for her father to get a good job and when the early 70s came, he was eventually able to get a job as a construction worker in Guam.
As a child, Ma’am Ahnnie was already starting to become a promising and ambitious young woman. The desire to do something big was already there since the beginning.
That time, she has dreamt of watching her favorite TV shows from her cousins’ house but several times, the door and windows would be shut. She and her sisters would just cry since they didn’t have a TV of their own.
“So nangarap ako. Sabi ko paglaki ko, bibili ako ng maraming TV. Lalagay ko sa lahat ng kwarto ng bahay namin,” she told herself.
(So I kept dreaming. I told myself that once I grew up, I would buy so many TVs. I would put a television in every room of our house.)
Maybe then the young Rosanni didn’t know it yet, but her dreams would start to come true one by one. Perhaps it was the karakol, perhaps it was the prayers.
But the biggest part of it is from herself. Galing sa Sarile.
Communicator at heart
The choices Ma’am Ahnnie made in life are a testament to how much creativity and passion live within her very core.
She stood out compared to the rest of her siblings when it came to their courses in college. While her sisters chose to take courses related to medicine or science, Ma’am Ahnnie was the only one who took up a liberal arts program at the Philippine Women’s University in Manila.
“AB Communication gusto ko, ako kasi yung pinakamaarte samin,” she joked.
(I chose AB Communication because I was the fanciest out of all of us.)
She was a working student then, with a scholarship as a student assistant, working at their college library. Ma’am Ahnnie was passionate about learning English and even dreamed of becoming a flight attendant.
“During my college days, marami na ‘kong sinalihan. Very adventurous kasi ako. I always take the risk,” she told me. “Gusto ko lagi yung meron akong ginagawa na kakaiba.”
(During my college days, I joined a lot of things. Because I’m very adventurous. I always take the risk. I always want to be doing something that’s different.)
That’s the reason why she also had a part in activism, joining student organizations fighting against Martial Law at the time.
In 1979, she graduated and started working as a teacher for public high schools for around 14 years. She mainly taught the subjects English and Speech & Drama.
From being a university student to finally teaching others, it was apparent that the field of communication is what she truly excelled at. There was something about the use of language and storytelling that made her fall in love with it so she studied it and taught it to others.
But her work as a high school teacher pales in comparison to the time when one of the biggest opportunities of her life finally arrived like a dream come true.
When DLSU-D created a possibility
It was the year 1993 when La Salle finally came into the picture. A friend referred Ma’am Ahnnie to a notice that De La Salle University-Dasmariñas was looking for faculty who could handle the AB Communication course.
That time, it was previously called AB English but since the original course wasn’t picking up any enrollees, it was transformed into AB Communication.
From a high school English teacher to a premier university’s department coordinator—that was how large the shift was in Ma’am Ahnnie’s life.
Others would feel too pressured and overwhelmed by the sudden responsibility of carrying a whole department on their backs, but that was not the case for Sarile.
“They needed somebody to be the coordinator. Kasi kailangan nga madagdagan ang students. Inatang sa ‘kin yung program,” she recalled. “Dahil ang lola mo ay risk-taker, sabi ko, ‘Sige ha, binigay niyo sa’kin ‘yan. Sige, gagawin ko ‘yan.’”
(They needed somebody to be the coordinator. Because we needed more enrollees. So the program was put on my shoulders. And since I’m a risk-taker, I took the challenge and said yes.)
La Salle saw something in her. And when I asked her what it was, she laughed and said, “Ewan ko sa kanila.” (I have no idea.)
But the true reason was how effective a teacher she was. When she applied to the university, all applicants had to do demo teaching. Inside the room were the first batch of AB Communication students, all six of them, as well as all the faculty of the Languages department.
She was being scrutinized, the faculty and the six students all looking intensely at her. Yet as soon as she began speaking, the communicator in her was able to embed her love for storytelling in the way she taught.
The story went like this:
In a certain community, there’s a farmer who wanted to sell products out of his poultry. But the houses in their village are too far apart from each other. So to be able to sell, he went from house to house. He went around the village as a town crier, broadcasting what he’s selling. Because of this, the people began buying his products. Then he thought of those people passing by in the tricycles and jeepneys. So the farmer took a plywood and wrote the words “Buy One, Take One”.
There was a lot more that came with it but with just that one story, she was already teaching them the basic concepts of advertising—an important subject in the Communication course.
When she was done, she was applauded by all the professors. Out of all the five applicants, only Ma’am Ahnnie got the position and was accepted to become a faculty in DLSU-D.
It was truly a dream come true for someone like her to begin teaching at the university. She was someone who came from a poor family who only dreamed of studying in De La Salle but couldn’t afford to.
“This is one of the best things that happened to me. Hindi [man] ako nakapag-aral sa De La Salle, but naging teacher ako ng De La Salle. Imagine mo? ‘Di ba pangarap ko lang ‘yun pero nagturo ako,” she said.
(I couldn’t afford to study in De La Salle, but eventually I became a teacher in De La Salle. Can you imagine? It was just my dream but I got to teach here.)
The battles of creating the CJD
Taking on the challenge to start the Communication and Journalism Department (CJD) was Ma’am Ahnnie’s mission in her first year in DLSU-D.
Along with the previous coordinator, they changed the entire curriculum. They wrote proposals. She tried to see how she could get equipment for production classes that the students could use.
Her main priority back then was to build laboratories for the department. She was held back by the school admin due to budget constraints, but she did not back down.
“If you want to offer COM here, magkaroon tayo ng laboratory. Hindi pwedeng puro salita lang. Hindi pwedeng puro theories,” she said.
(We need to have a laboratory. We can’t just focus on words. On theories.)
When she proposed the facilities needed for the department, she was told that the university didn’t have the budget for it. But she made the admin understand the need for state-of-the-art laboratory studios.
“So let’s not offer the course then,” she retorted to them. “Wag na natin i-offer yung program, wala pala kayong budget eh.”
(You don’t have a budget, so let’s not offer the program then.)
Ma’am Ahnnie walked out of the room that time, but she was immediately called back to stay. A compromise was made. She didn’t surrender because she knew the importance of laboratories and equipment for a course like Communication.
When it came to teaching the major subjects in the course, there were also many difficulties. In her first few months, it was only Sarile who taught the major subjects of Communication to the students.
Yes, she taught all those subjects alone.
Radio production, TV production, basic photography, photojournalism, theater arts, public relations, advertising — those are just some of the subjects she taught to the first batch of students of the Communication course back then.
“It was AB Communication, Major in Ahnnie Sarile,” she told me jokingly. “Some days, I would go to class and I’d have to ask the students what the subject was for that hour. It was stressful.”
Ma’am Ahnnie requested and hired for faculty, but she herself trained in screenwriting, script writing, basic photography, film, and other fields of communication just so she could teach the major subjects in an effective manner to her students.
“Wala akong tulog nun, isang oras lang lagi tulog ko sa dami ng iniisip kung paano maaayos ito,” she stressed.
(I had no sleep back then. I would just sleep for an hour every day because I had so much to think about to fix the program.)
Eventually, she got to invite faculty who are industry personalities like Ron Gagalac, Mark Salazar, Cecille Lardizabal, and Atom Araullo. She met film director Rahyan Carlos through a workshop she attended and invited him to teach in the course as well.
While other teachers were sleeping in the dead of the night, Ma’am Ahnnie was out with people from ABS-CBN and GMA, treating them for coffee and cakes to build connections and, ultimately, to promote the AB Communication course of DLSU-D.
One time when she went to one of the campuses of DLSU for benchmarking, but instead of helping, she was humiliated and ridiculed by the chair of the department.
“Why is La Salle offering two same programs?” she was told. But she just said thank you and left.
There were many hurdles in establishing the department. But in the end, her efforts bore fruits. She was able to achieve her vision and the Communication course in DLSU-D slowly became known.
A love for teaching, teaching with love
Ma’am Ahnnie’s battle cry in establishing the course was to implement hands-on training. She wanted to teach them as trainees, not just students.
“The [students] can read all the books, they can do all the theories. But when you become part of the industry, you would seldom use them. What’s important? The process, the methods, the strategies,” she said.
That’s why Ma’am Ahnnie became known as the professor who was very strict when it came to outputs and especially productions. Tough love was her branding whenever she taught in class.
If she would teach a lecture this week, the next week would be all productions. The students would be sleeping in the hallways, crying from stress but eventually smiling as soon as they saw the outputs they produced.
She’s realistic in the way she teaches, saying: “That’s how the industry is. The industry is tough! I want the students to know that the real world is all about business. They seldom keep friends. It has always been a survival-of-the-fittest world.”
Sarile’s vision as the founder of the CJD was to have students who were not boxed into one thing. To be jack of all trades, master of everything.
But despite the iron facade, Ahnnie Sarile felt joy whenever she saw her students graduate and go into different fields.
The Communication Arts Department (CAD) — now the Communication and Journalism Department — is her baby. And seeing her child grow prosperously is the mark of a true, loving mother.
When I asked her what her message was to other teachers like her, she said, “They should try their best to love their students. They should be passionate. A teacher cannot just depend on the process alone. They must at least practice what they teach.”
Until now, Ahnnie Sarile, at the age of 65, is still teaching as a part-time faculty in DLSU-D. She also teaches at Miriam College (formerly Maryknoll) in Quezon City under the Arts and Design department.
I asked her why she’s still teaching even though she now has the option to retire and relax, but she emphasized to me how teaching is her passion.
“I’m incredibly thankful to De La Salle-Dasmariñas for still accommodating me. I’m also deeply grateful to the department and the dean for continuing to trust me with the opportunity to teach,” she said.
“Hangga’t kaya ko, hangga’t may maiko-contribute ako, hangga’t ‘di pa ‘ko nagkaka-Alzheimer’s — magtuturo pa rin ako kasi mahal ko ang pagtuturo at makasama ang mga estudyante ko.”
(While I can continue, while I still have something to contribute, while I still don’t have Alzheimer’s disease — I will still teach because I love teaching and I love being with my students.)
