By Roxanne Paredes and Stephen Velasco

He may not be of our own color and blood but he certainly was on our side.

Candida G. Sarmiento’s thesis entitled, “The University of the Philippines, 1908-1986: as seen through the presidential papers” provides some insight into the first president’s life.

Murray Simpson Bartlett was the first president of the University of the Philippines. Despite being a New York native, he was really into improving the then existing educational system in the Philippines. Back on the grounds of Padre Faura Street in Manila, this man headed the original UP campus. Although he may seem like a clergyman at first glance (in fact, he is), he was also an educator, who, in his homeland, actively participated in various educational projects.

According to the text, Dr. Murray Simpson Bartlett was born 29th November 1871 in New York, USA. He attained his Bachelor of Arts in 1892 and finished his MA a year after. However, in 1896, he received his degree in Theology in the General Theological Seminary in New York.  After more or less 12 years, he gained a degree of Doctor of Divinity in the University of Rochester. With these achievements, he became parish priest and at some point, a rector, in different Catholic institutions in his country and in the Philippines.

He was given the offer of becoming the UP president, but did not accept it until 6th March 1911. He assumed position in 1st June of the same year. What he first did was to organize the University for administrative and academic functions, including the formal institution of the University Council. Due to the University being subsidized by the state, he presented proposals to plan the next five years in what he called “a continued appropriation for the University to be asked of the US-Philippine Commission and Philippine Assembly.”

Next order of business for Dr. Bartlett was to develop the Filipino faculty, wherein he sent scholars to the United States to study and eventually got back and teach in the Philippines.

Back then, getting into the University of the Philippines was already a daunting task. It was one of the outstanding features of the institution, in which applicants have to complete at least 14-18 units of Mathematics, Latin and Spanish, Physics, just to name a few, to attain entrance to the academic institution.

It was also in his time when the UPAA or UP Alumni Association was founded, 15th March 1913. The first Student Council was formed the following year.

His term as president ended during the commencement rites of 1914-1915, where the first Filipino president of UP, Ignacio Borbon Villamor, succeeded him.

The data may be incomplete, the dates may not be exact or his achievements may have been neglected, but one thing is for sure: this American man’s vision of a “University for the Filipino” still lives on today.