Jose Eduardo C. Delgado (JED), President of both Delbros, Inc. and Delbros Waterfront Leasing Company Co., Inc. (Delwater), conducted a special and first-of-its-kind Navigation Course for 21 Boy Scouts and 24 Girl Scouts on September 29, 2007 at the BSP National Office, Ermita, Manila.

The Navigation Course was among the several training activities included in BSP’s Special Program for Senior Scouts and Rover Scouts given on two consecutive weekends (Fri-Sun) in September on the behest of Trinity College – High School of Quezon City.

JED, a licensed pilot and an accomplished outdoorsman, designed and developed the Navigation course himself.  The course is aimed at teaching young boys and girls the basics of map reading and establishing bearing.  After successfully completing the course, a participant should never again get lost for as long as he/she has the correct map of a given place, according to JED.

The class started with a lecture-orientation on latitudes and longitudes and how to read and locate specific coordinates around the globe and on maps of varying scales.  This was followed by a short review of the primary and secondary directions and how to establish bearing using a compass.

The course shifted to workshop mode after the short introductory lecture.  The participants were divided into several groups.  Each group is assigned a specific map to navigate and a set of instructions to follow.  The instructions include locating specific coordinates in the map, determining bearing of a coordinate in relation to another, and measuring/estimating the distance between coordinates.  A group would have successfully completed the exercise if they are able to correctly navigate from a given point of origin to a certain pre-determined destination, with several “stops” in between.  They should also be able to accurately estimate the distance, travel time (given a specified average travel speed),  and fuel consumption from origin to destination.

To aid the participants in completing their navigation assignments JED taught them how to prepare their own “navigation tools” using rudimentary materials like bond papers and pencils.  The participants then proceeded to prepare their own “GPS rulers” for accurately estimating specific coordinates between grids in a map, as well as distance measuring rulers based on the scale of their respective maps.

JED’s Navigation Course was among the top three activities that the participants said they enjoyed the most in the 2-weekend special program.  The other two most-liked activities were Wall Climbing and Rappelling.

JED conducted another Navigation class the following weekend (Oct 6), this time to would-be Merit Badge Counselors and Trainers for the Navigation Course.  Ten Scouters successfully completed the course.

JED is the National Program Commissioner of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines.  By extension, both Delbros and Delwater are active supporters of the Scouting Movement in the Philippines.  In fact, JED was assisted by two other Delwater managers in the workshop portion of the Navigation course conducted on Sept. 29.  They are Gig Hagad, Logistics Manager, and Bong Saculles, Chief Information Officer.  Saculles also completed the special Navigation course for Merit Badge Counselors and Trainers. # /RUS