A fit criteria for judgment

Kaizen Anielle Mendoza

Pageants and beauty contests alike bring joy to the audience watching and confidence to the contestants. Due to their impact on students and teachers alike, intramurals and sports festivals give the student body the chance to enjoy the various activities being presented as well as offer them pageants and contests that will allow its contestants to shine and show their best to their peers.

With its occurrence, one can be grateful for the opportunity to experience what contests like this hold, especially after a long time spent online with no means to join said contests. However, though the pageant may just be the most awaited part of various school-wide events, when its judges set certain criteria that fails to include inclusivity, then one’s perception of this contest begins to turn into a negative one.

Of course, there are those factors like confidence in one’s person as well as stage presence that should stay present in the criterion for judging. In this case, it is certainly important for a contestant to possess these qualities that would really help them achieve the most charming version of themselves on stage. Yet, if a person were to judge someone and deem them unworthy of being called a winner based on their physical fitness, then this would be the time where a re-evaluation of the criteria should be made.

Though it may be common in society for beauty pageants to require their participants to possess a certain body type, as an institution whose aim is to become more accepting of its students, we must reject the notion that being physically fit and having the “ideal body type” makes for a worthy winner in a pageant. Although it is important to maintain a healthy lifestyle, a difference in body types does not make for an unhealthy one. Just as every person is different in personality, so do the bodies we walk this life with are; and there should be no shame in that.

Knowing this, is it really important to have a “physically fit” criterion for beauty pageants? Possessing this specific criteria in judging a pageant contestant only promotes more bad than it does good. For one, we would be isolating those people whose bodies differ from the “physically fit” ones, or as society seems to call it: the “ideal ones.” Not only does this cause exclusion of different people, but it also promotes the belief that one must be a certain way or have a certain type of body in order to “win.”

Moreover, as school events catered to showcase student talents provide an outlet for them to shine, erasing this criteria of judging would bolster not only the contestants’ confidence, but the audiences’ as well. To see a fellow student with a body type deemed as “unacceptable” by mainstream media and society truly shine on stage will only carve a path towards acceptance—towards a path wherein no one will ever have to judge another or themselves for the body they were born with.

Once again, we must not forget to consider our health. Though one may argue that keeping this criteria inspires one to exercise and achieve physical fitness, another can say that achieving that goal can be done so through other means, and that keeping this criteria will only inspire insecurity and a negative self-image among the people; especially in our students.

So, for the next time our institution holds event pageants, it is with great hope that judges will reconsider and re-evaluate their criteria for judging.

Luministere

Saira Vanessa Varon

Since the beginning of the academic year, a set time frame has been set for research. As everything gradually went back to the usual prepandemic schooling, schedules of students and teachers sometimes do not match up. While most groups can match their schedules and brainstorm, STRIDE groups who are from different strands struggle to meet and find the time when every member is available to focus on their research. This causes not just missed deadlines on what they need to submit but also pushes back their planned agendas and is much worse if that group has to undergo experiments or surveys. The system makes it unfair for groups that have everything planned out but are held back due to poor scheduling and external factors that they cannot control.

is everyone’s goal, however, these circumstances make it impossible for them to do so despite doing their best to do so. It cannot be easily concluded that these are just because of the students as we need to see that it is the system that makes it difficult to comply with research. Often, these concerns are not addressed and are overlooked especially when it comes to schedules, availability of research advisers or statisticians, or their unresponsiveness. If such problems arise, it becomes a hurdle that limits a researcher’s capacity or even competence. Research as we know is establishing facts and investigating to reach and solve problems but with these circumstances, researchers fail to do so. Their progresses and

We must cultivate a community that is accepting of all body types, even the ones that society deems as “unideal.” Only then can we consider the true meaning of a pageant winner.