Information Sharing with the PCDSPO (Presidential Communications Development and Strategic Planning)

 

         The UP Vargas Museum and Filipiniana Research Center Library and Archives received a formal request from the PCDSPO (Presidential Communications Development and Strategic Planning) office for possible information-sharing system partnership on May 2013.  The PCDSPO’s objective was to fast-track their websites’ digitization of government historical documents to make them readily available to the public. Likewise, PCDSPO’s aim is to be the source of accurate and authentic documents from their partner institutions.

 

            The archive and library collection of the Vargas Museum’s strength is on the three historic periods of the Philippines, the American Colonial Era, the Commonwealth Period and the Japanese Occupation. Mr. Vargas had served the Philippine government from the period mentioned and as a result, he was able to acquire a considerable number of important documents related to the periods aside from the filipiniana library materials.

 

            The information-sharing partnership request with the PCDSPO was proposed for the reason that, the office saw the importance of the Vargas filipiniana library collection and the materials they found that are related to what they need, cannot be found anywhere else. PDCSPO sought to duplicate by digitization the copies of the select published materials from the UPVM library and archives collection. To set the limitations and guidelines both parties for the collaboration drafted the Terms of Reference for the information-sharing partnership. The final draft was submitted to the UP Diliman Chancellor and the Legal Office for advice after which it was referred to the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Development for review.    

 

            As of present, the Terms of Reference (TOR) for the partnership is still with the UP Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Development for evaluation as referred by the UP Legal Office. While waiting for the TOR and the Memorandum of Agreement between the University of the Philippines and the PCDSPO, personnel from the PCDSPO was given the approval by the Vargas Museum curator to commence digitization of the documents covered by the TOR in the agreement. It was agreed by both parties that the PCDSPO will not publish online or in print pending the approval of the TOR and the MOA. Digitization of the documents from the Vargas' library and archives collection was completed in December 2014. The team that digitized the select published materials (Official Gazettes, etc) used a special scanner for the delicate pages to minimize damage to the book/materials. Both parties are hopeful that the scanned documents will be made available through PCDSPO's website the Official Gazette (URL: www.gov.ph) in the first quarter of 2016.