GOAL setting has paid off for Reya Siojo — Class of 2026 valedictorian of the Philippine Science High School-Cordillera Administrative Region Campus in Baguio — who is bound for Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the United States on a full four-year scholarship covering tuition, housing, living expenses and annual airfare.
A report by Frank Cimatu published June 5 on the Baguio news website Mountain Beacon said that Siojo, “after returning from a visit to the US in 2025, quietly decided she wanted to pursue her college education there. Without informing her family, she began applying to several American universities, aware that the odds were steep for an international student seeking full financial aid.”
Among the schools she sent letters to were Washington and Lee University in Virginia, Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma, National Sun Yat-Sen University in Taiwan, and De La Salle University in Manila, which all accepted her.
She also qualified for the University of the Philippines’ highly selective Integrated Liberal Arts and Medicine program, an accelerated track leading to a medical degree, said the Mountain Beacon report.
She was waitlisted at Princeton University in New Jersey, University of Notre Dame in Indiana, and Amherst College in Massachusetts, and was rejected in other schools.
But for Siojo, Harvard was top of mind. Founded in 1636, Harvard is the oldest higher education institution in the US and a top-ranked university worldwide.
“I knew I had a very slim chance,” the Mountain Beacon quoted Siojo. “The night before Harvard released its decision, Reya couldn’t sleep. ‘What if I didn’t get accepted to an Ivy League school? What if all of it was for nothing?’”
Upon getting a positive response, Siojo announced it on her Facebook page: “I got accepted to Harvard.”
“Friends and educators describe Siojo as a student whose academic excellence never overshadowed her humility. Through years of demanding coursework at Pisay, she remained focused on a dream that seemed distant and uncertain,” said the Mountain Beacon report.
Hitting her goal of studying abroad brought back the memory of Siojo’s mother, whom she lost to an accident on the day she turned seven years old.
Leslie Siojo, who had also been an achiever, wrote a note that Reya kept close to her heart: “I know my kids will follow my footsteps, particularly in academics because all these medals I had during my school years, I dedicate it now [to] them, making it their inspiration to go further. Hihigitan niyo pa ang mga na-achieve ko before (You will achieve even more than I did before)."