Wendell Capili, writer and academic, may very well be the incarnation of Prof. Keating’s character (played by Robin Williams) in the film Dead Poets Society.

His students at the University of the Philippines Diliman, where he taught communication and humanities courses before completing his PhD at the Research School of Pacific and Asian studies, Australian National University (ANU) in Australia (he just got back after three years), remember him as a “life coach” who tapped their inner strength, gave them confidence, and believed in them (scroll through his Friendster testimonials).

At the College of Arts and Letters, where he is associate dean for administration and development, Capili is referred to fondly as someone deeply committed to teaching and especially to the university.

Between 2001 and 2002, he made the rounds of the Senate and Congress, tracking down old students from more than a decade of teaching, and writing overseas Pinoys for financial assistance to build new classrooms for the university. They responded, and they gave in legion—proof that Filipinos, wherever they may be in the global community, do care.

The journey hasn’t been an easy one for Capili. In Sampaloc, where he spent his growing years, he remembers that other children—offspring of the rich and famous—were favored more. The discrimination continued even into the academe, never mind that he had several degrees, or was widely published in local and international literary journals, or that he also reaped his share of awards (from the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature, the Cultural Center of the Philippines, and from UP).

It’s this experience—and the fact that he has a learning disability, diagnosed when he was 30—that allows him to easily understand the confused teenager who has nobody to talk to, who struggles in class, and who may not seem to be getting anywhere.

His secret? Empathy, and maybe the fact that he doesn’t take his defects—or himself—to seriously.

PinoyCentric: We heard that you joined the ABS-CBN game show Game K N B.

Jose Wendell Capili: Yes, I joined about 2001 or 2002, but I didn’t win. I had to do it to raise money for UP because at that time Sen. John Osmeña slashed the budget of the university.

Other units like the Colleges of Engineering, Law, and Business [Administration] have alumni who are all rich and could sustain them. Unfortunately, the College of Arts and Letters have artists and scholars—brilliant people but not money makers.

My argument was, all freshmen students take GE [general education] classes. It’s GE that excites the UP person’s mind because he meets people from other colleges, high schools, and regions. For some of them, this is where they meet their lovers or crushes, or people who encourage them.

GE classes also involve values formation, so we need to make GE more exciting, more appetizing, and more delectable for the students. Not all who go to these classes are finished products. Some were really raw.

PC: Please tell us about your experience with the show.

JWC: During the first taping, the game show people thought we were answering the questions very well so they had to tape it again, because we had to finish it within the 30 minutes. This was a feature on artists teaching at the university, and it included Gamaliel Viray, Fritz Ynfante, Gil Portes, and a few other artists. But then they realized we were so good in the humanities, they decide to ask a question that was so tricky.

PC: What was that question?

JWC: How many zeros are there in one trillion? So I was counting: one, two, three, and I wasn’t able to answer. Gamaliel Viray won, and it was good too because he needed the money for his diabetes treatment. I felt he really deserved it.

PC: But a student told me that you were able to raise money for the CAL building.

JWC: Yes, I was able to help raise P120 million, and not a single cent had gone to me. I delayed my PhD for eight years because I had to fight for my tenure. And then when I became associate dean for administration, I was told to raise money for CAL because most of the rooms were in Palma Hall and were all bulok, remember?

I thought, how can you possibly encourage people to take GE if we don’t take care of our GE classes? So I thought we really should have an active campaign to raise the money. And so I posted a letter on the Internet saying UP needs classrooms because it’s expanding and the government has not been supporting the university.

PC: How long did it take you to raise the P120 million?

JWC: We did the fundraising between 2001 and 2002, and the building was inaugurated 2003. This is located behind the Vargas Museum and the Faculty Center.

I began with the pledges that the previous dean, Josefina Agravante, got. [Quezon City] Mayor Sonny Belmonte, then a congressman, made a pledge, so [under Dean Rosario Torres Yu and Dean and National Artist Virgilio Almario]* we had to fight with the Department of Budget and Management to release the money. All this time, the administration would get pledges, but it took some time to release them.

So Mayor Belmonte pledged around P30 million, but we only got around P10 to P15 million. At that time, Benjamin Diokno was the secretary of budget under Erap [former president Joseph Estrada], and UP was against Erap so they were limiting it.

I also went to the Senate and to the House of Representatives. I went to [Cong.] Alan Cayetano, who was my student. At that time, he had his own constituency so he couldn’t help me, but he made referrals. The secretaries and staff members of other congressmen and senators were either my students or friends of my students, or boyfriends or girlfriends or lovers or exes of my students. They felt they had to do something about it.

And then I went to companies and sent e-mails to different embassies and individuals. And all of a sudden, they responded because, after all, I was not getting anything out of it. The cheques were addressed to UP, and there’s a ceremony. I’m just some kind of a broker. We bring them to UP and they meet the officials, and then there’s an official signing, and in exchange, we name them in a plaque for each classroom.

I also went to [Sen. Francis] “Kiko” Pangilinan’s office and joked, “We have the most number of Sharon Cuneta fans!” Of course, he laughed, but he realized that we needed the money. [Sen. Franklin] Drilon also helped.

I wanted to show that we are one at the University of the Philippines. We are a national university. But the money we have is not enough to make the university competitive. I thought that we should take the initiative to make the university world-class.

I draw from my experiences of studying at the University of Cambridge, Tokyo University, and at the Australian National University. We have great people—brilliant professors and staff— but we don’t have the money to keep the university running on that very competitive level.

And I see my students who have classes in rooms where the electric sockets don’t work or which were unpainted. Sometimes, we would run out of classrooms. Some of us held classes in the streets or sidewalks or dilapidated buildings. I remember having a class at the bodega of the College of Mass Communication because that was the only room available.

So I felt we had to do something. I was aggressive because I’ve been teaching for a long time. I could teach or work in any place around the world, but I chose to come home. But unfortunately, not all my colleagues could do that because they had families to support. So we need to make UP attractive. We may not compete with the salaries offered by other universities, but one step is to improve the quality of our classrooms.

I wasn’t expecting anything. I knew I had a mission even before. I knew I wanted to be a priest or a doctor or a lawyer. And when I started to teach at UP right after graduation, I decided to stay. Having been a teacher to all these students—from Karen Davila, Dodge Dillague, Gilbert Remulla, Ate Glow, Alan Cayetano, doctors and lawyers and all kinds of people from different sectors—I knew that I had to be an instrument to encourage people to stay in the Philippines or for those overseas to remain faithful to being Filipino.

You don’t lose your being Filipino. Wherever you go, you should help the country or the university. Some had to go abroad for their families and because of the political conditions of the country. You don’t take it against them. But many of those who went overseas also gave money to help with the building. Regardless of where you are, the bottom line is, if you come from this country or this university, you need to help. And they did. I was shocked and also very happy. I was confident because I didn’t get a single cent out of it. Ang saya-saya ko kasi it’s the kind of fulfillment you don’t get from anything. So I’m so proud of it.

PC: Let’s talk about you as a writer. What inspires your writing?

JWC: I think what inspires my writing is the fact that I grew up in Sampaloc, in Manila, where you have the rich, the poor, and the middle class—so I was exposed to cultural stratification. I knew that my writing, along with my teaching, can be very vital and instrumental in encouraging people and transforming the lives of those I get in touch with.

What’s great about having a blog [ PC: Do you sometimes consider it a punishment to have a position in the academe?

Photos of the CAL building can be found at Wendell Capili’s blog, Away from Canberra.

Photos by Luis Liwanag

* Changes were made to this article on May 19, 2007.