• Childhood Education

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    Education in Calamba

    The familiar statement that Doña Teodora was Rizal's first teacher is not just a sort of "venerating his mother who sacrificed a lot for our hero. It was actually a technical truth. In his memoirs, Rizal wrote. "My mother taught me how to read and to say haltingly the humble prayers which I raised fervently to God."

    In Rizal's time, seldom would one see a highly educated woman of fine culture, like Doña Teodora who had the capacity to teach Spanish, reading, poetry, and values through rare story books. Lolay, indeed, was the first teacher of the hero- teaching him Spanish, correcting his composed poems, and coaching him in rhetoric. On her lap, Jose learned the alphabet and Catholic prayers at the age of three, and learned to read and write at age of 5.


    Aside from his mother, Jose's sister Saturnina and three maternal uncles also mentored him. His uncle Jose Alberto taught him painting, sketching, and sculpture. Uncle Gregorio influenced him to further love reading. Uncle Manuel, for his part developed Rizal's physical skills in martial arts, like wrestling.

    To further enhance what Rizal had learned, private tutors were hired to give him lessons at home. Thus, Maestro Celestino tutored him, and Maestro Lucas Padua later succeeded Celestino. Afterward, a former classmate of Don Francisco, Leon Monroy, lived at the Rizal home to become the boy's tutor in Spanish and Latin. Sadly, Monroy died five months later.

     


    Education in Binan

    Rizal was subsequently sent to a private school in Biñan. In June 1869, his brother Paciano brought him to the school of Maestro Justiniano Aquino Cruz. The school was in the teacher's house, a small nipa house near the home of Jose's aunt where he stayed In Rizal's own words, his teacher "knew by the heart the grammars by Nebrija and Gainza."

    During Rizal's first day at the Biñan school, the teacher asked him:

    "Do you know Spanish?"

    "A little, sir" replied Rizal

    "Do you know Latin?"

    "A little, sir."

    Because of this, his classmates, especially the teacher's son Pedro, laughed at the newcomer. So later in that day, Jose challenged the bully Pedro to a fight. Having learned wrestling from his Uncle Manuel, the younger and smaller Jose defeated his tormenter.

    After the class, he had an arm-wrestling match with his classmate Andres Salandanan. In that match, however, Jose lost and even almost cracked his head on the sidewalk. In the following days, Jose was said to have some other fights with Biñan boys. (If his average was two fights per day, as what happened during his first day in Biñan school, then he might have been more active than today’s MMA [mixed martial arts] fighters). For his scuffles, he nonetheless received many whippings and blows on the open palm from his disciplinarian teacher.

    Rizal might not have won all his brawls but he, nevertheless, beat all Biñan boys academically in Spanish, Latin, and many other subjects. After sometime, Jose told his father that he had already learned all there was to be taught in Biñan. Don Francisco firmly scolded Jose and hustled him back to the school. Maestro Cruz, Jose's teacher in Biñan, later confirmed, however, that Jose had indeed finished already all the needed curricular works. So despite his wife's reluctance, Don Francisco then decided to send Jose to a school in Manila.

     


  • Higher Education in Manila and Europe

    • Don Francisco sent his son Jose for further education to Manila in June 1872. Paciano found Jose a boarding house in Intramuros though Jose later transferred to a house on Calle Carballo in the Santa Cruz area. In the following year, Jose transferred residence to No. 6 Calle Magallanes. Two years later, he became an intern (boarding student) at Ateneo and stayed there until his graduation from the institution.

    From 1877 to 1882, Rizal studied at the University of Santo Tomas, enrolling in the course Philosophy and Letters, but shifted to Medicine a year after. During his first year at UST, he simultaneously took at the Ateneo a vocational course leading to being an expert surveyor. He boarded in the house of a certain Concha Leyva in Intramuros, and later in Casa Tomasina, at Calle 6, Santo Tomas, Intramuros. In Casa Tomasina, his landlord and uncle Antonio Rivera had a daughter, Leonor, who became Jose's sweetheart.

     


    Education at the Ateneo

    There is a claim that from the Biñan school, Rizal studied at Colegio de San Juan de Letran. The supposed story stated that after attending his classes for almost three months in Letran, Jose was asked by the Dominican friars to look for another school because of his radical and bold questions.

    However, standard biographies agree that Rizal just took the entrance examination in that institution, but Don Francisco sent him to enroll instead in Ateneo Municipal in June 1872. Run by the Jesuit congregation (Society of Jesus). Ateneo upheld religious instruction, advanced education, rigid discipline, physical culture, and cultivation of the arts, like music, drawing, and painting. (Ironically, this school, which is now the archrival of De La Salle in being exclusively luxurious, among others, was formerly the Escuela Pia (Charity School)-a school for poor boys in Manila established by the city government in 1817.)

    Paciano found Jose a boarding house in Intramuros but Jose later transferred to the house of a spinster situated on Calle Carballo in the Santa Cruz area. There he became acquainted with various mestizos who were said to be begotten by friars. (Jose perhaps had not thought twice to befriend them, believing that they were probably nice people for after all, they were "mga anak ng pari" [children of priests]).

    To encourage healthy competitions, classes at the Ateneo were divided into two groups, which constantly competed against each other. One group, named the Roman Empire, comprised the interns (boarders) while the other one, the Carthaginian Empire, consisted of the externs (non-boarders). Within an empire, members were also in continuous competition as they vied for the top ranks called dignitaries Emperor, being the highest position, followed by Tribune, Decurion, Centurion, and Standard-Bearer, respectively. Initially placed at the tail of the class as a newcomer, Jose was soon continually promoted that just after a month, he had become an Emperor, receiving a religious picture as a prize.

    When the term ended, he attained the mark of "excellent" in all the subjects and in the examinations. The second year, Jose transferred residence to No. 6 Calle Magallanes. He obtained a medal at the end of that academic term. In the third year, he won prizes in the quarterly examinations. The following year, his parents placed him as intern (boarding student) in the school and stayed there until his graduation. At the end of the school year, he garnered five medals, with which he said he could somewhat repay his father for his sacrifices. On March 23, 1877, he received the Bachelor of Arts degree, graduating as one of the nine students in his class declared "sobresaliente" or outstanding.

    Some of his priest-professors at the Ateneo were Jose Bech, a man with mood swings and somewhat of a lunatic and of an uneven humor: Francisco de Paula Sanchez, an upright, earnest, and caring teacher whom Rizal considered his best professor: Jose Vilaclara; and a certain Mineves. At the Ateneo. Rizal cultivated his talent in poetry, applied himself regularly to gymnastics, and devoted time to painting and sculpture. Don Augustin Saez, another professor, thoughtfully guided him in drawing and painting, and the Filipino Romualdo de Jesus lovingly instructed him in sculpture.

     


    Education at the UST

    In 1877. Rizal enrolled in the University of Santo Tomas, taking the course on Philosophy and Letters. At the same time, however, he took at the Ateneo a land- surveyor and assessor's degree (expert surveyor), a vocational course. He finished his surveyor's training in 1877, passed the licensing examination in May 1878 though the license was granted to him only in 1881 when he reached the age of majority.

    After a year at UST, Jose changed course and enrolled in Medicine to be able to cure the deteriorating eyesight of his mother. Being tired of the discrimination by the Dominican professors against Filipino students, he nonetheless stopped attending classes at UST in 1882. It is worthwhile to note that another reason for Rizal's not completing medicine at UST was that the method of instruction was obsolete and repressive. (Rizal's observation perhaps had served as a challenge for UST to improve its mode of instruction.)

    If records were accurate, Rizal had taken a total of 19 subjects in UST and finished them with varied grades, ranging from excellent to fair. Notably, he got 'excellent' in all his subjects in the Philosophy course.

     


    Education in Europe

    On May 3, 1882. Rizal left for Spain and enrolled in Medicine and Philosophy and Letters at the Universidad Central de Madrid on November 3. On some days of November 1884, Rizal was involved in the chaotic student demonstrations by the Central University students in which many were wounded, hit by cane, arrested. and imprisoned. The protest rallies started after Dr. Miguel Morayta had been excommunicated by bishops for delivering a liberal speech, proclaiming the freedom of science and the teacher, at the opening ceremony of the academic year. (Incidentally, the street in Manila named after Morayta ["Nicanor Reyes Street today] has always been affected by, if not itself the venue of, student demonstrations.)

    In June of 1884, Rizal received the degree of Licentiate in Medicine at the age of 23, His rating though was just "fair" for it was affected by the "low" grades he got from UST. In the next school year (1884-1885), he took and completed three additional subjects leading to the Doctor of Medicine degree. He was not awarded the Doctor's diploma though for failing to pay the fee and the required thesis.

    Exactly on his 24th birthday, the Madrid university awarded him the degree of Licentiate in Philosophy and Letters with the grade of "excellent" (sobresaliente). (One can thus make the argument that Rizal was better as a "philosopher" than a physician.)

    Wanting to cure his mother's advancing blindness, Rizal went to Paris. He was said to have attended medical lectures at the University of Paris. From November 1885 to February 1886, he worked as an assistant to Dr. Louis de Weckert. Through this leading French ophthalmologist, Rizal thankfully learned how to perform all the ophthalmological operations.

    On February 3, 1886, Rizal arrived in Heidelberg, Germany. He attended the lectures of Dr. Otto Becker and Professor Wilhelm Kuehne at the University of Heidelberg. He also worked at the University Eye Hospital under the guidance of Dr. Becker. Under the direction of this renowned German ophthalmologist, Rizal had learned to use the then newly invented ophthalmoscope (invented by Hermann von Helmholtz), which he later used to operate on his mother's eye. In Heidelberg. the 25-year-old Rizal completed his eye specialization.

    Afterward, Rizal spent three months in the nearby village, Wilhemsfeld, where he wrote the last few chapters of Noli Me Tangere. He stayed at the pastoral house of a kind Protestant pastor, Dr. Karl Ullmer, the whole family of whom became Rizal's good friends. In August 1886, he attended lectures on history and psychology at the University of Leipzig. In November 1886, he reached Berlin, the famous city where he worked as an assistant in Dr. Schweigger's clinic and attended lectures at the University of Berlin.

    In Berlin, he was inducted as a member of the Berlin's "Ethnological Society," "Anthropological Society," "Geographical Society". In April 1887, he was invited to deliver an address in German before the "Ethnographic Society of Berlin on the orthography and structure of the Tagalog language.

    In Germany, Rizal met and befriended the famous academicians and scholars at the time. Among them were Prof. Friedrich Ratzel, a German historian; Dr. Hanz Meyer, a German anthropologist: Dr. Feodor Jagor, the author of Travels in the Philippines, which Rizal had read as a student in Manila: Dr. Rudolf Virchow, a German anthropologist; and Rudolf's son. Dr. Hans Virchow, Descriptive Anatomy professor.

    Especially after the hero's martyrdom, these people who were the renowned personalities in the academe not only in Germany but also in Europe were so proud that once in their lives they had known the educated and great Filipino named Jose Rizal.



    (https://ourhappyschool.com/philippine-studies/jose-rizals-education)