The SDG Seminar 2 series, with the theme “Effective Tools in Presenting and Analyzing SDG Data Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic”, was done virtually on February 2-4, 2021 following the New Normal adapted by government agencies in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic. It was attended by 129 CALABARZON delegates overall, specifically from the provinces of Batangas and Rizal. They were joined by representatives from the DILG and PSA Regional Office IV-A, and Field Offices in Batangas and Rizal.

PSRTI Executive Director Josefina V. Almeda, PhD, officially opened the conduct of the seminar and welcomed the participants. This was followed by the SDG Overview by Ms. Maria Praxedes R. Pena, Chief Statistical Specialist of the PSRTI Training Division. Afterwards, Ms. Jomel Jhele T. Sadsad, Senior Statistical Specialist of the PSRTI Training Division, gave an introduction to Basic Concepts in Statistics and discussed the Textual and Tabular Presentation of Data.

For the second day, Ms. Jazel Ann G. Ramos, Statistical Specialist I of the PSRTI Training Division, continued the discussion of Effective Presentation of Data with a lecture on the Graphical Presentation. In the afternoon, a hands-on demonstration on selected graphs using MS Excel was given by Ms. Kristine Honey M. Villa, Statistical Specialist II of the PSRTI Training Division.

The third day of the seminar was allocated for the lectures on Descriptive Statistics given by Ms. Sadsad as well as by Mr. Jose Pedro E. Cuartero, Project Development Officer, also of the PSRTI Training Division. Mr. Cuartero likewise gave a short hands-on demonstration for computing Descriptive Statistics using MS Excel.

For the closing program, Ms. Rheanalyn Laylo of LGU Lipa, Batangas and Ms. Charity Bautista of PSA Region IV-A gave their impressions on the general organization of the training program, the resource persons, Zoom as a platform, the topics, and the training team. Afterwards, the seminar was formally closed by the DILG Regional Office IV-A Regional Director Ariel O. Iglesia, CESO IV.

Several participant feedback included comments that they ”learned a lot from the seminar, as it was very informative and fun.” Other remarks were, ”They are very satisfied with the information learned, and that it would help a lot in providing accurate data for their Local Government Unit. The lecture was easy to follow and instructions were very clear. The seminar was a complete success; it was well-organized and training coordinators are very responsive.” In the impression given by Ms. Rheanalyn Laylo regarding the general organization of the seminar “the training was conducted in an interactive manner with full participation of those attended. Over, all I would recommend PSRTI, this seminar is a STANDOUT.”

The SDG Seminar 2: Effective Tools in Presenting and Analyzing SDG Data Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic is the follow-through activity from the 2017-2019 SDG Seminar I series. For the year 2021, this batch of delegates also kicks-off the SDG Seminar 2 series for the remaining 15 Regions not covered during the 2020 conduct.