A Negrense educator was awarded the Global Educationist Leader Award 2021 on December 5 together with 218 awardees from 71 countries by the International Internship University accredited and affiliated with the World Education Organization (WEO) and International Accreditation Organization (IAO).
George De La Cruz, a registered nurse and former writer for the Negros Daily Bulletin, and now an educator at the Handumanan National High School, belongs to the first batch of scholars of the Global Schools Program for its cohort training, an initiative of the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) in support of UNESCO’s Global Action Program on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD).
De La Cruz is among the 180 educators from 50 countries who were selected to become Global Schools Advocates and trained in five months in 2020 for localizing and integrating global citizenship, sustainability and 21st century skills into school communities. He has been recognized as Advocate of the Month by the Global Schools Program.
He had been invited as one of the featured speakers during the 9th International Conference on Sustainable Development in September and in the international academic fora across Malaysia, India, Togo, Turkey, Mexico, and Nigeria. He is also a certified mentor for educators who are advocates of sustainable development.
The Sustainable Development Goals or Global Goals were adopted by all member states of the United Nations (UN) in 2015, as a “universal call” to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030.
De La Cruz is a recipient of various online training courses of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization Asia-Pacific Center of Education for International Understanding since 2019 to present.
He is also a recipient of scholarship program on Cultural Education by the National Commission on Culture and the Arts through the Philippine Cultural Exchange Program and the Western Mindanao State University.*
