University of the Philippines in the Visayas

The University of the Philippines Visayas (UPV or UP Visayas) is a public research university in the Philippines. A constituent university of the University of the Philippines system, it teaches management, accountancy, marketing, economics, chemistry, applied mathematics and physics, marine science education and research, fisheries, and aquaculture. It offers regional studies programs on the preservation and enrichment of the Visayan cultural heritage. UP Visayas has three campuses--Miagao, Iloilo City, and Tacloban—with Miagao being the main campus with its central administration offices. The University of the Philippines Cebu College was part of UP Visayas but it separated in September 2010, after being declared an autonomous unit. Most of the students of the university are drawn from the Visayas and the Visayan linguistic groups. Many of the leaders of the Visayas graduated from UPV or its predecessor institutions. As of 2007, the Commission on Higher Education of the Philippines awarded four National Centers of Excellence and Development to UPV including Fisheries (UPV-Miagao), Marine Science (UPV-Miagao), and Biology (UPV-Miagao).UPV was created by merging four UP colleges: UP College of Fisheries founded in 1944; UP Cebu founded in 1918, UP Iloilo founded in 1947, and UP Tacloban founded in 1973. When the Miagao campus was established, many of the academic programs offered in the Iloilo City campus were moved there. To this day, the faculty, staff and students travel between the Iloilo City and Miagao campuses. During the term of UP President Onofre D. Corpuz in 1975 an interdisciplinary team within the university conceived of an autonomous unit which would become an institution for fisheries and marine science education and research. The idea was fleshed out in a proposal entitled "Education Development Plan for the University of the Philippines in the Visayas", a six-volume report by the interdisciplinary team. The new university would evolve from the UP College of Iloilo and the College of Fisheries in Diliman, which would transfer to its new site in the Visayas. Funding was to come partly from a government loan, to be negotiated with the World Bank for the development of fisheries education.