President of the University of San Carlos

Jesuits of Colegio de San Ildefonso in Cebu (1595–1769)

The Colegio de San Ildefonso in Cebu City, Philippines, was established in August 1595 by three Spanish Jesuit missionaries including Fr. Antonio Sedeño, SJ, Fr. Pedro Chirino, SJ, and Fr. Antonio Pereira, SJ. The regional deployment was led directly by Fr. Antonio Sedeño, who served as the Vice-Provincial and superior of the entire Jesuit mission in the Philippines during that era.^[5]Under his guidance, the missionaries arrived in Cebu to build a strategic ecclesiastical footprint and educational program, establishing one of the earliest European-style grammar schools in Asia.^[6] However, following Sedeño's death shortly after its August 1595 founding, the direct, on-site administrative leadership and role of Rector was held by Fr. Pedro Chirino, SJ, who managed the day-to-day operations of the institution.^[7] Chirino left around 1602 to travel to Rome and Madrid as a procurator representing the Philippine Jesuit mission. Father Antonio Pereira and other resident Jesuit priests continued to teach and run the grammar school. In 1606, the school officially received its formal name, Colegio de San Ildefonso, under continued Jesuit management.The school operated successfully until 1768, when a royal decree issued by King Charles III expelling the Jesuits from all Spanish domains forced its sudden closure, marking the end of its first historical chapter and setting up its later rebirth as the modern University of San Carlos.

The school operated directly under the changing missionary assignments of the local residence, where it was managed by a rotating sequence of Jesuit Rectors, Superiors, and Visitors tasked with running its grammar and primary school courses:^[8]

• Fr. Alonso de Humanes, SJ (1606–1608): Served as the initial on-site rector and residential superior when the institution was officially named the Colegio de San Ildefonso.^[8]
• Fr. Diego García, SJ (1608): Serving as the official Jesuit Mission Visitor, he managed a major structural downscaling of the school when a large portion of Cebu’s Spanish demographic relocated to Manila.^[8]
• Fr. Pedro Chirino, SJ (1606–1620s): Reassumed localized administrative and educational governance in the Visayas after returning from his mission procurement journey to Rome and Madrid.^[8]
• Fr. Gregorio López, SJ (1620s–1630s): Governed the wider region as a Provincial leader who audited, funded, and reassigned local teachers to maintain the Cebu grammar school's operations.^[8]
• Fr. Juan de Bueras, SJ (1630s–1640s): A high-ranking administrator who directly managed the physical estate, financial assets, and property holdings linked to the Cebu house.^[8]
• Fr. José Lamberti, SJ (1700s–1750s): A prominent mid-18th-century Jesuit administrator who supervised instructional curriculum and regional missionary assignments across the Visayas.^[8]
• Fr. Domingo Inchausti, SJ (1760s–1769): Served as the final official Jesuit Rector of the college and the Vice-Provincial superior. His term came to an end when King Charles III's royal decree of expulsion was executed in Cebu, resulting in his arrest and the closure of the school.^[8]

Secular Rectors of the Real Seminario de San Carlos (1779–1867)

Realizing the sudden gap in local education after expelling the Jesuits, King Charles III and the church authorities in Cebu initiated by Bishop Mateo Joaquín de Arévalo worked to repurpose the facilities.^[9] In 1779, King Charles III once again granted anew royal decree that allowed the school to be reopened under the Diocesan of Cebu, which it officially did in 1783 under the name Real Seminario de San Carlos in honor of the reigning monarch's royal patron saint, St. Charles Borromeo, while also paying homage to the reigning monarch, King Charles III himself. ^[10]

Real Seminario de San Carlos, reopened in 1783 by Bishop Mateo Joaquin Rubio de Arevalo of the Diocese of Cebu. Despite the opening of the Seminary in 1783, there were no permanent faculty members during the first few years of its operation, as hardly anyone was trained for seminary administration and theological teaching. In 1825, the Seminary's first rector, Fr. José Morales del Rosario, was appointed by Bishop Francisco Genoves, and was followed by a series of secular rectors until 1867.^[11]

Vincentian Rectors (1867–1935)

On 19 October 1852, Isabella II of Spain created the Congregation of the Mission to administer the Conciliar Seminaries in the Philippines. With this, Bishop Romualdo Jimeno of Cebu invited the Padres Paules (Vincentians) to take over the Seminary in 1863. In 1867, the Seminary, which was previously renamed as the Seminario Conciliar de San Carlos, was formally turned over to Fr. José Casarramona, CM., who became the rector. On May 15, 1867, under the rectorate of Fr. Casarramona, the Seminary allowed laymen to study as externs (colegiales), marking the beginning of the Seminario-Colegio which later became the University of San Carlos.^{[citation needed]}

Under the Vincentian rectorship, the Seminary and College were made into separate institutions in response to Pope Pius XI's apostolic letter Officiorum omnium^[12], which decreed that "seminaries should serve no other purpose than that for which they were founded."^[13] Fr. H. Garcia was appointed as the Colegio's first Rector.^[14]

SVD Rectors and Presidents (1935 - present)

In 1935, the Society of the Divine Word (SVD) took over the Colegio de San Carlos. The first SVD rector was Fr. Arthur F. Dingman, who is the namesake of the main building of the University's Downtown Campus, located along P. del Rosario Street. The Colegio was elevated to university status in 1948, during Fr. Dingman's second term.^{[citation needed]}

In 1964, the rectorate was re-established as the Office of the University President, with Fr. Rudolph Rahmann, SVD being the president. In 1970, Fr. Rahmann was succeeded by Fr. Amante Castillo, SVD, the University's first Filipino president.^[1] Following Fr. Castillo, Fr. Margarito Alingasa, SVD oversaw the filipinization of the University of San Carlos, in response to Presidential Decree No. 176.^[15] As of 2024, every president since Fr. Castillo's presidency has been Filipino.

The longest consecutively serving president has been Fr. Dionisio M. Miranda, SVD (2008–2020), who was conferred with the title of President Emeritus in 2023.^[16]

List of Rectors and Presidents

After King Charles III expelled the Jesuits, he reinstated the school under the Diocese of Cebu led by Bishop Mateo Joaquín de Arévalo.^[17] Later, Fr. José Morales del Rosario was appointed by Bishop Francisco Genoves of Cebu. ^[17][18]After his appointment in 1825, he was followed by a consecutive line of diocesan secular rectors (including Miguel Nicolas Carmelo, Mariano de los Santos, and Esteban Meneses). ^[19]

There is a dispute regarding the founding date of the University of San Carlos, and the origin of the office of the University President. The superiors of the Jesuit Colegio de San Ildefonso are not listed here. See above