The World economic scenario is rapidly changing. Many small countries are getting empowered losing their dependence on the traditional economic forces that used to control them. The Philippines is one such country. It is currently experiencing an economic boom. Construction and development are moving at an enprecedented pace.

Foreign and local companies are investing huge amounts of capital into the economy not only in the traditional urban centers but also in the countryside. Technology is the biggest factor in the developments that are sweeping the world. Previous business and management practices, which were extremely successful in the past, are rapidly facing competition in forms and situations that never existed before.

Management is evolving so fast that practice, even current ones are being threatened with obsolescence before they can even established. Institutions have to adjust to these trends. Programs have to be more relevant. It is a time to change. John F. Kennedy once stated "those that live in the past and the present cannot be ready for the future". In De La Salle Lipa, we live the future now…

De La Salle Lipa is an educational institution strategically located in the heart of the most populated province, of the most populated region in the Philippines today. It caters to the educational needs of a growing population in the center of the major government developmental thrust in the Southern Tagalog region – the CALABARZON project.

There is a shortage of experience and skilled management practitioners in the area that many employees are recruited from Manila or even abroad. The increasing demand for masteral graduates at home with technology cannot be matched by the current output of the educational system.

De La Salle Lipa has been traditionally a net contributor of trained manpower. It intends to be an active resource for young men and women needed by the rapidly developing economies of Batangas, Region IV and the Philippines. It has a track record of performance in various educational fields that has placed it among the most prestigious schools of the region.

De La Salle Lipa is part of the network of De La Salle institutions that continue the tradition of excellence, community spirit and relevance.

The Management Technology Development Centre (MTDC) was organized in November 1995 to service all the professional development offerings of De La Salle Lipa. The five-storey structure is the home of the Graduate School and Master in Management Technology Program. It has fully air-conditioned case room, computer laboratories, communications facilities and internet, offices, conference and similar facilities, and executive lounge, a three hundred seating capacity auditorium which are available for, a 900 seat library with multimedia rooms and a fifteen person capacity elevator is also available in the building. Graduate programs and professional development courses were based in the MTDC building.

On the west side of the college building is the SENTRUM. It houses facilities such as: a fully covered gymnasium, a formal lobby, bleachers with a seating capacity of 3,500, refreshment areas, comfort rooms, locker and shower rooms, stage with dressing rooms, technicians’ booth, offices, storage areas, a laminated wood playing court, etc. A professional quality lighting system for the playing area, and electronic scoreboard and a high quality sound system are only some of the facilities available for the holistic development of its students. The SENTRUM was blessed in December 1995 and is considered to be the first international caliber sports facility in Batangas province.

Construction of the Management Technology Development Centre started on February 14, 1996. It was opened to the public in October 1996 in time for the Master in Management Technology program.

The MTDC building is a five-storey structure housing the graduate school, the Master in Management Technology Program, the Doctor of Management Technology program, the future masteral programs, case rooms, a 900 seat library, an Internet multimedia center, audio-visual facilities, offices, an auditorium, conference rooms, faculty rooms and dining facilities. The building also houses the science and technology, and communications facilities. The building also houses the science and technology, and communications facilities of De La Salle Lipa including about 160 computers used by the faculty, staff, graduate and tertiary school students.

The Chéz Avenir was inaugurated on 1 August 1997. It has 4 suites, 6 single rooms, and a host of amenities one will never expect to find in an academic institution.

The Unified School Buildings and the Tertiary School Clusters has change the façade of the school. Rising four storeys high, is the biggest construction project De La Salle Lipa has undertake in this decade.

Other planned projects for the school include the construction of more facilities for the campus including the Olympic sized swimming pool, retreat house, glass tower and administrative offices.

The Doctor of Management Technology (DMT) program was conceived to fill the void that the generalized management courses have with regard to technology and its use. Much like its predecessor, the Master in Management Technology Program, the proposed Doctor of Management Technology program (DMT) is designed to have basic advantages that a generalized doctoral program in business or economics could offer and add a bias towards the use of technology. This bias is developed by allowing the students to choose which area of technology they would like to specialize in. Like most post graduate management courses in the world, the program requires research, economics, finance, marketing and general management. Other areas dealt with will be in strategic planning, human resource management, information systems management, business methods, government, creative and intuitive management.

Like the MMT, the DMT program is also not a technical course. It is a post-graduate management program that provides its students with a competitive edge of the use of management, technology and research in organizational settings. The end product is a graduate who would have the theoretical and practical skills expected of experienced managers including familiarity and knowledge of computers and other technologies. They are expected to have a keen insight and appreciation of the research and modeling of components of current management technology practices.

The Proposed Doctor of Management Technology program is 48 units broken down as follows:

Foundation courses (9 units), Core courses (21 units), Management Technology electives (12 units), and the Management Technology Research Report (6 units). The initial course offering is designed for a part-time student. Subjects will be conducted from 5:30-8:30 p.m. on weekdays and the whole day on Saturdays. Classes are expected to have only 25 to 40 students each. Full time courses will be offered in the future.

De La Salle Lipa has the prestige and the access to the professorial talents found in the De La Salle network. It offers graduate courses, professional development programs, short courses and seminars and have these courses accredited in La Salle’s own masteral programs. La Salle has already started modular education which will eventually lead to distance education, twinning and consortium-type arrangements with other institutions in the country. Major advantages of De La Salle arise from its track record of excellence, a deep resource base and available facilities both for immediate utilization and maximum future expansion. The physical facilities already existing in the campus provide an ambiance suitable for learning. The La Salle network is also supported by the economic leaders and has maintained educational excellence through generations. It is one of the first educational institutions in the country with the global communication link-up to the Internet. It has a network of hundreds of computers, of which over one hundred and forty units are already in the MTDC.

In August 1996, even before the MTDC building was constructed, the Management Training Development Centre provided the backbone of support to the Asian Institute of Management (AIM) by digitizing all the papers (in record time) of the "First Business Research Conference" of the Association of Deans of Southeast Asian Graduate Schools of Management (ADSGM). Since then, it has supported several other national and international projects including some sponsored by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund (OECF), and the International Maritime Organization (IMO). Locally, it has done cooperative work with the U.P. Marine Science Institute, the provincial government of Batangas, Jesus Delgado Memorial Hospital, U.P. Los Baños, Pablo Borbon Memorial Institute of Technology, Lipa City Colleges, Lipa Public Colleges, U.P. Diliman, De La Salle University and the Asian Institute of Management.

DLSL has a strong social infrastructure brought about by that Christian leadership and value orientation of the La Salle brothers.

De La Salle Lipa pioneered the Master in Management and Technology Program in Batangas, in the Southern Tagalog Region and the whole country. As an Institution, it is willing, ready and able to face the challenges and opportunities of the 21^st Century in order to contribute to national development through relevant graduate education.

Aside from the Graduate School, the Management Training Development Centre provides support services to the institution and the community. The Academic Corporate Exchange (ACE) provides research, consultancy, training, facilities and management assistance to the community. It is currently involved with several international organizations (OECF, UNDP, ADSGM, etc.) and the top institutions (AIM, U.P., DLSU and Ateneo) doing research and providing management, consultancy and Information Technology services.

Since February 1996, the MTDC has hosted several seminars, conferences and training sessions for the benefit of the community including the first CALABARZON Conference on Management and Technology in August 1997 where the chairman of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED), Hon. Angel Alcala announced he would support for the establishment of a Doctor in Management Technology Program for De La Salle Lipa after the success of the Master in Management Technology Program.

The Technology Resource Unit (TRU) has trained a significant number of students, faculty and members of the community since it launched the "Strategic Information Technology Exchange" (SITE) in April 1996. Originally scheduled to be offered twice a year, the course has been successfully conducted ten times in 15 months.