De La Salle University may be one of the country’s most popular schools, but there are some things that we still don’t know about it. Here are a few:
1. De La Salle University’s original home was not in Taft Avenue but in Paco on Calle Nozaleda (presently General Luna Street), and with only 125 enrollees, all boys. It moved to Taft in 1921.
2. Green and white are the school colors. Green is a tribute to their founding fathers’ Irish origins; white alludes to the Philippines as being the Pearl of the Orient Seas.
3. Green Archers was a name coined for its basketball players when its student publication printed the archer symbol in a feature article about the NCAA games in 1940.
4. Business tycoons, national artists, and politicians are among the university’s prominent alumni, including JG Summit Holdings Chairman Emeritus John Gokongwei Jr., Globe Telecom President and CEO Ernest Cu, SM Land Inc. President Henry T. Sy Jr., former Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto G. Romulo, and National Artist of the Philippines for Architecture Leandro Locsin.
5. The Green Archer statue stands majestically at the Chess Plaza, and symbolizes La Sallian Excellence. The statue was created by award-winning Filipino sculptor Ed Castrillo in 1985; Castrillo also made the People Power Monument along EDSA.
6. De La Salle University has over 150 collegiate championships under its belt, including 16 in basketball , 32 in football/soccer, 16 in swimming, and 19 in tennis.
7. To celebrate a hundred years of La Sallian presence in the country, the De La Salle Centennial Banknotes were released last December 7, 2012. Only 10 million pesos worth of DLSU stamped bills were produced.
8. De La Salle University’s solar-powered car, Sikat II, was the country’s official participant to the 2013 World Solar Challenge, a most prestigious solar racing event. It raced a total of 2,487 solar kilometers, beating Hong Kong, Turkey, and USA in Darwin, Australia last October 2013. In 2009, it made a historic 50-day tour across the Philippines.
9. The Animo Squad has won three cheerleading championships. In 1926, it only had four members; all of them male! Among its popular fighting songs and cheers include “Go La Salle,” “Oh When La Salle Goes Marching In,” “Victory Song,” “Rektikano,” “Derecho La Salle,” and “Animo La Salle.”
10. St. La Salle Hall is the only Philippine structure noted in the book “1001 Buildings You Must See Before You Die: The World’s Architectural Masterpieces.”
AHEAD Tutorial & Review Center is now accepting applications for its 2014 College Entrance Test (CET) Review for the DLSUCAT. AHEAD’s CET Review is designed to get you into such dream colleges as De La Salle University.