CATHOLIC EDUCATION The Holy Angel Academy, founded by Juan and Teresa Nepomuceno in 1933 for their son, Javier Jesus, evolved into the Holy Angel University, the country’s first Catholic university founded by laypersons. —Tonette T. Orejas
ANGELES CITY, PAMPANGA, Philippines — Two universities in this city in Pampanga—one with a 91-year legacy, the other spanning 62 years—have flourished over time.
The third-generation heirs leading the Holy Angel University (HAU) and Angeles University Foundation (AUF) believed they became good, if not the best, in what they do in their field because their institutions adhere to the values passed down by their founders, using these as guideposts in meeting today’s challenges.
HAU: School built by servant-leaders
“All for the glory of God,” the motto of HAU founder Don Juan Nepomuceno, is not only etched on his gravestone. It is in the HAU mission statement, his grandson Leopoldo Jaime Valdes, the current university president, said.
The maxim that his grandmother Doña Teresa Nepomuceno lived by—“Do it well or not at all”—has become the quality statement that is seen on campus.
“Our grandparents were, in a way, servant-leaders. They didn’t bring attention to themselves; they just served. They’re philanthropists,” Valdes said, referring to the couple’s commercial and social enterprises that helped grow Angeles City, then Barrio Kuliat, that Juan’s great grandfather, Don Angel Pantaleon de Miranda, founded.
The couple started the Angeles Electric Light and Power Plant in 1923 because the Holy Rosary Church needed electricity. They opened the Holy Angel Academy for their firstborn, Javier Jesus (Jave) and other youth who wanted to finish high school without studying in the capital Manila.
Teresa handled the operations and Juan, the accounting and bookkeeping side. The children learned honest labor and discipline by working in the businesses and made sacrifices because their two houses accommodated the relatives.
Beyond wealth
Valdes, a son of Aurora, the seventh among the 10 Nepomuceno children, had what he called the “extraordinary privilege” of growing and learning from his grandparents.
At one time when businesses slumped, the elders ditched tinsels and glued instead “papel de Hapon” for a Christmas tree on the wall. From this, Valdes learned that the so-called old money from the wedding gifts of lands and gold coins was fleeting.
“Industriousness, working hard, doing things for others— these are more important than the wealth you currently have. We never thought that we were rich. We kept thinking we had a lot of work to do,” he added.
So beginning with 78 students in 1933, the enrollees grew to 14,026 this 2024, with 5,779 of them as scholars. HAU evolved as the first Catholic school in the Philippines that was founded and managed by laypersons.
It is the first co-ed Catholic high school that produced government officials, business leaders, trailblazers in the private sector, artists, religious persons and rebels. It received the Philippine Quality Award among higher education institutions accredited by the Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges and Universities (Paascu).
On account of his bloodline, background and work in HAU since 2016 in learning systems, Valdes was chosen by the board to head HAU in 2021 after the death of Dr. Luis Maria Calingo from complications of COVID-19 that year. Choosing Valdes was in line with the results of a 2015 survey that showed a strong clamor to have a family member lead the school.
“Every president of the university has contributed to where it is right now. There are no right or wrong presidents,” Valdes said.
Following its founders’ lead, HAU is not driven by profit.
“It’s motivated by family and God and their values. In crises like World War II and Mt. Pinatubo’s eruptions, the [family] kept steadfast. The family comes in to rebuild. We always look around in our community and to society in general to see what we can do to support. And all the other family businesses are meant to do that,” he said.
“We live these every day,” Valdes further said, adding, “We return to the vision-mission cycle and try to connect everything back to the founders as much as possible while looking forward.”
He noted that there was clarification of roles at times. “Are we here to direct or are we here to serve? It is the service that is most important.”
‘Upside-down pyramid’
“The organization is like an upside-down pyramid, where the head, I myself, is at the bottom, and I serve all people above me, and they serve all the people above them. The goal is to be a servant first, a leader second. The goal is to serve the priority needs of the people who work with us. In this, the students and their parents are at the very top,” Valdes said.
At least 680 of the close to 1,000 employees of HAU are teachers who are helped to imbibe the values and believe in the vision-mission.
Valdes tells the story and values of Juan and Teresa to new employees. A cartoon character was made of Juan to inspire enthusiasm among the youth.
“Laus deo semper” (Praise God always) is the battlecry cascaded by being a good model,” he said.
PRAISE, PERSISTENCE Leopoldo Jaime Valdes is the third generation Nepomuceno heir leading the Holy Angel University’s educational battlecry “Laus Deo Semper” (Praise God always). Another Pampanga university, the Angeles University Foundation (right), is a story of persistence by the founder, Barbara Yap-Angeles; her son, Emmanuel, who turned it into a foundation; and her grandson, Joseph Emmanuel (below), who is leading it to prepare students for the modern challenges of education. —Tonette T. Orejas
Some courses are offered for their importance rather than for money, like cybersecurity or a Green MBA for sustainability. It sustains the Center for Kapampangan Studies to help preserve the language and culture.
It looks at the success of students and graduates. “Where are our graduates today? What did we do to get them there?” Valdes said.
Based on the 2022-2023 tracer study, HAU graduates posted an 87-percent employability rate. The School of Arts and Sciences registered a rate of 88 percent; the School of Business and Accountancy, 88 percent; the School of Engineering and Architecture, 63 percent; the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 93 percent; the School of Computing, 100 percent; the College of Criminal Justice Education and Forensic, 87 percent; the School of Nursing and Allied Medical Sciences, 64 percent; and the School of Education, 94 percent. It offers less than 90 programs.
“We knew we were different because of the way we were founded and how we were resilient over the years,” Valdes said.
He added: “The important measure of a university that’s supposed to be cared [for] is that we did not leave anyone behind. And because we have to think in that respect, we have to think about those who failed. We are looking at failure as not a negative but something that actually leads to strength.
AUF: Giving the poor access to education
Barbara Yap-Angeles closed the Angeles Academy three years after she opened it in 1933. Many endeavors, including motherhood, got her away from her dream of reviving the school.
She picked up the dream again in 1962 by establishing the Angeles Institute of Technology (AIT) on proceeds of sold or pawned jewelry. Her eldest son, former Commission on Higher Education head Dr. Emmanuel Yap Angeles, recovered some of his mother’s jewelry and paid all her loans in 1975, or 13 years later. He also gave up his law practice to help her grow AIT.
“Nobody should be deprived of education because of poverty,” was what she often told him.
The Department of Education granted AIT university status in 1971. Emmanuel converted the school into a foundation and a Catholic university in 1975. He inaugurated the AUF Medical Center in 1990 and established centers of excellence at AUF, mostly on grants and tie-ups with more than 200 universities and benefactors from all over the world.
Lawyer Joseph Emmanuel Angeles, the second of three children of Emmanuel and Dr. Cornelia Pabico Lukban, assumed the position of university president in 2009.
“AUF was already well-known, especially for our nursing and medicine courses, when I assumed at the prodding of Tatang [Emmanuel], then AUF president Dr. Ricardo Pama and the AUF Trustees. I knew I had large shoes to fill. Tatang was the driving force behind the reestablishment of AUF, and the architect of AUF’s achieving university status within nine years, its conversion to a nonprofit foundation and recognition as a Catholic university,” Angeles said.
Quality
“Cognizant of this legacy, I built upon this foundation to ensure the AUF founders’ enduring contribution to Philippine education,” he added.
His focus, he said, is to attain the highest quality Catholic education and make it accessible to Filipinos.
“In doing so, we bring to life AUF’s mission of ‘Total Development of Man for God and Humanity,” Angeles shared.
According to him, the fulfillment of that mission can be seen from the overall board examination passing rate of 70.87 percent in 2009 and 86.98 percent in 2023; and Paascu accreditation of 19 programs in 2009 and 70 in 2023.
Joseph Emmanuel Angeles, AUF president
Its Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) Centers of Excellence (COEs)/Development (CODs) totaled one COE in Information Technology in 2009 and five centers in 2023 (COE in Information Technology, COE in Teacher Education, COE in Criminology, COD in Computer Engineering and COD in Nursing).
AUF has also been recently included in the 2025 QS Asian Ranking (QSAR 2025). In Asia, it was ranked 901+; and in Southeast Asia, 169. AUF is the only private university in Central Luzon that was ranked in QSAR 2025. In The Impact Rankings, he said AUF was ranked as one of the top universities in the country along with the University of Santo Tomas, University of the Philippines and Ateneo de Manila University.
In the Student Mobility and Openness Category of The World University Rankings for Innovation, AUF was ranked 57th in the world and 3ed in the Philippines.
Sharing narrative
Angeles said it was important to share the narrative. “Lola Barang passed away before I was born, but her values were passed on through Tatang’s anecdotes over the dinner table. Tatang would similarly pass on his values and experiences through his own anecdotes and example.”
He said he learned from her charity and concern for the disadvantaged.
“Tatang attested to Lola Barang’s remarkable generosity, exemplified by her pawning jewelry to help others. From Tatang, that virtue of charity was reinforced, and to that he added the virtues of grit, hard work, discipline, and the ability to walk with kings, but not lose the common touch,” Angeles said.
That generosity, he added, has continued through AUF’s scholarship programs that have benefited more than 78,000 students at a cost of over P1.36 billion from 1975 to 2023. His leadership introduced pillars of quality and accessibility.
“Without quality and accessibility, AUF has no reason for being. Only with these foundations can AUF properly assume the mantle of a world-class Catholic university,” Angeles said.
With these, new programs and institutes came. Among them are the AUF School of Law, headed by retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Jose Vitug, which has been recognized by the Legal Education Board and Supreme Court for its bar examination performance. The Confucius Institute at AUF was awarded multiple times as Confucius Institute of the Year in 2011, 2013 and 2017.
The AUF Senior High School has been recognized by the Department of Science and Technology for their innovative research. The recently launched BS Human Biology program would allow exceptional students to complete their medicine studies at AUF within six years.