The quiet power of SHS internship

By Herman M. Lagon

The most honest classroom rarely has blackboards. Some of the most valuable classrooms do not look like classrooms at all. They look like offices filled with paperwork, supervisors offering instructions, and desks where the day moves according to deadlines. That was the atmosphere I sensed while speaking to the Grade 12 Agustinian students of St. Augustine Catholic School in Dumangas during their immersion culmination. Their work immersion lasted about 10 days. It may sound brief, yet it often becomes a student’s first real encounter with professional expectations. Instead of memorizing lessons, they begin facing practical questions: Are you dependable? Can you communicate clearly? Can you accept guidance when you make mistakes?

Work immersion in senior high school exists to create that moment. Under the K to 12 program, students spend time in workplaces connected to their field of study, usually between 80 and 320 hours depending on their strand (Department of Education, 2017). The intention is simple — bridge classroom learning with real environments. Studies on experiential learning show that exposure to real workplaces improves confidence, adaptability and professional awareness (Dewey, 1938; Flores & Dela Cruz, 2025). Students refine technical abilities, but they also develop the softer skills — communication, teamwork and time management — that employers repeatedly say they value.

Listening to the students’ reflections, the pattern was familiar. Some laughed about waking up earlier than usual. Others admitted feeling nervous on their first day. One student said answering phones politely is more complicated than it looks. Another realized spreadsheets demand patience. These are small lessons, yet they build professional awareness. Learning happens when expectations meet reality. That quiet collision is the magic of immersion.

The program resonates with me personally. Years ago, when Senior High School was still new, I helped oversee the immersion program of Ateneo de Iloilo Senior High School as associate principal before later becoming principal. We had more than 200 Grade 12 students from the ABM and STEM tracks. Our team had to build partnerships almost from scratch, eventually signing around 51 memoranda of agreement with hospitals, engineering firms, laboratories, media companies and IT institutions across Iloilo. Some placements even extended to Cebu and Singapore. Coordinating everything felt overwhelming at times.

Yet those hectic months remain among the most meaningful parts of my career. I remember students reporting to hospitals in crisp uniforms, slightly nervous but eager. Others assisted accountants reviewing financial records. STEM students watched laboratory procedures with the seriousness of apprentices. Many returned surprised by how demanding professional life could be. That realization — when theory meets responsibility — is difficult to manufacture inside a classroom.

Years later, many of those students have moved far beyond their immersion days. Some are now engineers designing structures. Others run businesses or manage teams. A number are finishing law school or preparing for board exams. Of course, a short immersion does not create these achievements on its own. But those early exposures helped shape how they imagined their futures. Sometimes a brief encounter with reality is enough to ignite long-term direction.

I saw the same lesson again when I later served as head of the linkages office of the university where I now work. Part of my job involved supervising immersion students from nearby towns, including some who traveled from San Joaquin. Watching them navigate unfamiliar offices reminded me how much learning happens quietly. They discovered how paperwork flows through departments, how teams coordinate projects, and how workplaces run through a mix of systems and Filipino diskarte.

Ten days cannot replicate the complexity of a career. Critics are right about that. But even a short immersion gives students perspective. A student assigned to a clinic quickly realizes that medicine involves more paperwork than television dramas suggest. A student in a business office learns that customer service requires patience, not just charm. They also discover an old professional truth: your network is your net worth. Along the way, students encounter a practical truth of professional life: relationships carry weight. The familiar phrase “your network is your net worth” begins to make sense. They realize that dealing with people requires more than competence; it calls for grit, empathy, listening and the humility to hold back quick judgment. These lessons rarely appear in school modules, yet they stay. Ten days may feel brief, but sometimes they are enough to remind young people that education begins to matter when it starts serving life.

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Doc H fondly describes himself as a ‘student of and for life’ who, like many others, aspires to a life-giving and why-driven world that is grounded in social justice and the pursuit of happiness. His views here do not necessarily reflect those of the institutions he is employed by or connected with.