President

Magtanggol Gatdula is the current President of St John Colleges of Calamba Alumni Foundation, Inc. Fondly called “Tanggol” by his close friends, he graduated from St John Academy as the valedictorian of Class1971. Tanggol distinguished himself when he won the gold medal in the General Information contest in the 17th National Private Schools Athletic Association (PRISAA) in 1971 bringing honor again as the 3rd St John Academy’s National champion after Cresencio Wong ‘68 and Teresita Dela Vega ‘69.After almost a year of studies in UP Los Baños, Tanggol passed the highly competitive written and physical examinations and was accepted as a cadet in the Philippine Military Academy graduating number 12 in 1976. As a young second lieutenant, he was sent to Jolo, Sulu for field duties where he was wounded in action in one of their combat operations against the secessionist Moro National Liberation Front,the considered enemy of the State then aside from the communist rebels. Despite the regimented life of a military man, the opportunity of further education and training was not ignored by him He finished the Bachelor of Laws in 1983 and passed the Bar examinations in 1984. He has a Master’s degree in Public Administration and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Peace and Security Administration, aside from several expertises he gathered from the various trainings he undertook both here and abroad; like the psychological operations and instructor’s courses in the US Army; the FBI Academy course of the US Department of Justice; the Hostage Negotiation course of the US State Department’s Anti Terrorism Assistance Program. He also participated in several training and retraining sessions of the Interpol and FBI when he was the NBI Director and was then chosen as first ever Filipino Regional President of the FBI National Academy in Asia-Pacific. A bemedalled military veteran and law enforcement officer, he retired from the active service in 2010 with the rank of police major general(2 stars).Retired but not yet tired, Tanggol is still working as president-chairman and consultant of several private corporations while actively doing volunteer works for charitable institutions and associations. “It’s payback time to be involved with St John Academy, my school!”