Filipino journalist receives research grant in Beijing

Ruffolo’s nomination for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-China Young Leaders Scholarship Program was approved by the Consulate General of the People’s Republic of China in Cebu.

Ruffolo, a native of the municipality of Liloan in northern Cebu, is a multidisciplinary professional who worked as a journalist in various capacities at CDN Digital and Cebu Daily News. She covered business and economics, politics and lifestyle and wrote special reports and feature stories as a correspondent and reporter before becoming a copy editor and later managing editor.

During the early years of her journalistic career, she wrote for the Philippine Daily Inquirer, SunStar Cebu and The Freeman.

She currently works as an independent journalist, writing about travel, business, economics and human interest stories.

Ruffolo currently serves as the chair of the nonprofit organization Basadours Inc., which she co-founded in 2012 with young professionals from various fields.

Basadours Inc. organizes storytelling sessions and art workshops in the community to contribute to literacy development and spread the love of reading among young learners.

Ruffolo graduated with a degree in Mass Communication from the University of the Philippines Cebu (2007). She holds degrees in Language and Literacy Education (2016) and Professional Education (2021) from UP Open University and Cebu Technological University, respectively.

She is a certified teacher.

Ruffolo studied Chinese language and culture at the Confucius Institute, Ateneo De Manila University in 2009 and at Fudan University in Shanghai, China in 2010 under the Gokongwei Brothers’ Foundation China Scholarship Program.

She is currently pursuing further education in development communication, language education and literature.

Ruffolo is a multi-award-winning journalist, community volunteer and youth leader. He has received awards from the Globe Media Excellence Awards, the University of the Philippines Cebu Alumni Association, the Philippine National Volunteer Service Coordinating Agency, The Outstanding Students of the Philippines and the City Government of Cebu, among others.

As part of the ASEAN-China Young Leaders Program, Ruffolo will take courses and participate in workshops on journalism and communication research design, media technology applications, global news communication, English-language news writing, measuring communication effectiveness, and finding and using academic sources.

These courses will enable her to write a research paper on how the social media platform Tiktok is being used by peer support groups in Cebu to combat online child sexual exploitation.

As part of this fellowship, she will also work on a Binisaya’ng Sugbuanon English-Chinese children’s storybook that highlights the strong cultural and family ties between the Philippines and China.

The ASEAN-China Young Leaders Scholarship Programme is an initiative to strengthen educational cooperation and people-to-people ties between China and ASEAN. (PR)