A Balik-Scientist of DOST from Oklahoma State University, Dr. Alejandro Tongco was invited by SDSSU to give the identified SDSSU faculty members an intensive training workshop on Geographic Information System from July 7-11, 2017 at the Old Library of SDSSU-Main Campus. 

On its first day, Dr. Baceledes R. Estal, SUC President II, articulated that SDSSU is committed in its goal to achieve quality education, thus, his unrelenting emphasis was to strengthen the research  capability of the SDSSU faculty who are expected to produce quality outputs focused on the mandates of the University.

The GSIS training workshop which is one of the targeted research activities for the year was conducted to introduce GIS technologies to SDSSU administrators, faculty, researchers and extension planners with the intention of equipping the academic community with the fundamental GIS skills to assist in adding value to their researches and projects.

The objectives for the said activity covered the following: Acquire fundamentals of GIS and basic GIS software skills and Incorporate fresh ideas for research and instructional development purposes; thus, the participants were challenged to produce a mini GIS project as the very culmination of the training-workshop. 

The rest of the week proved to be hellacious for all the participants as they strived to complete the GIS manual prepared by DR. Tongco which came in handy when they started preparing the Mini GIS-project. 

During the entire workshop, Dr. Tongco kept track on the progress of each participant with a score board to ignite motivation on their end. On its last stretch, the University President joined the group again to witness the presentation of outputs where he informed everyone that research fund will be granted to those outputs which will be relevant to the University and will pass the evaluation process.