This section is dedicated to news pertaining to the JRU Public Intellectual Forum. There are three key words to remember about this section --- Public, Intellectual and Forum.

Public means people. And people is the source of power in a democracy. As they say, the authority of the government emanates from the people. Hence, There is a Latin dictum which says, "Vox Populi, vox dei", which means that the voice of the people is the voice of God.

The second key term is intellectual. Which means men of reason. Men who could be dispassionate in their critical analysis of socio-political-economic events, past, present and future. Men in the genre of the philosophers of yore, like Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle; and in the 20th and 21st centuries in the category of Lord Beltrand Russel, Alfred North Whitehead, or Albert Einstein. But you might say that this is too ambitious. And so I would settle from people with a lot of common sense, down-to-earth mortals who have demonstrated a decent level of commitment and dedication to their chosen professions, vocations, or calling in life. People, for example, who would leave their comfort zone, and would muster enough moral courage and daring to pass the gauntlets --- and put their principles to the bar of public scrutiny.

The third key is the forum, historically, the name of a public market place of an ancient Roman city; which is contemporary times has metamorphosed into an assembly where public affairs are discussed, intelligently.

My dream, our dream in Jose Rizal University, which is named after our national hero and no less, an intellectual and a genius, is to conduct this public intellectual forum on a monthly basis. The coverage would be a broad range of topics under the sun, which are meant to put in the crucible the socio-political, economic issues and other issues of import affecting our community, to analyze these earth-shaking issue, and hopefully by the output of a discussion, to improve the quality of life in our planet.