I wish to express my warmest compliments to the faculty, staff administration and students of the Iloilo City Community College (ICCC). The people behind the ICCC have made it possible for our young men and women to receive quality tertiary education. Benjamin Franklin, one of the honored founding fathers of the United States, said that “an investment in knowledge pays the best interest”. Education is a blue chip investment, the safest bet that we have to ensure the future of our children. In a highly competitive world where expertise and familiarity in various fields are necessary to secure a job or to start an entrepreneurial endeavour, it is a must for all of our high school graduates to receive higher education so that they could have the tools to succeed in life. The ICCC gives our students coming from families with financial difficulties the opportunity to receive the quality education that they would have missed out on had they been limited by their lack of resources. Education is not a privilege reserved for the rich, for it is an essential right which all of our children should enjoy. Material assets and temporary reliefs could provide immediate assistance to the less fortunate, but it is through education that we give our fellow countrymen the skills and competencies to improve their lives. Education is enternal, and it is an asset which could never be dissipated by the passage of time.