New Salesian presence in Guam given full media treatment

The following comes from the kuam.com site:

With the re-opening of the school year, and new Salesian management at the Fr. Duenas Memorial School, media in the U.S. Northern Pacific Micronesian Territory have been eager to offer a glimpse of the new arrangements. Local TV and the Kuam Daily have both reported on the newcomers.

Fr. Vitaliano Dimaranan, SDB, aka Fr. Chito, is the principal and heads up a small community of three confreres -- two at the moment, the third being due at any moment once visa arrangements are complete.

Archbishop Tony Apuron sought the help of the Salesians a year ago to run a school named after the second Chamorro priest to be ordained, just prior to the Japanese occupation in 1941. He was eventually beheaded by the occupying troops in a spot close by the school, which opened immediately post-war. Widely regarded as a martyr, his name now lives on in what Fr. Chito calls a “development in the 60-year-old tradition of the school.”

In his various press interviews Fr. Chito has indicated that at this point he has drawn up a draft document, a “principal's thrust.” “Changes will happen gradually and those changes will definitely not depend on me, on the Salesians, but on the people who are on the board.” The Kuam Daily report indicates that “Fr. Chito wants to improve the library, science labs and other facilities that he realizes were hit hard by Typhoon Pongsona, and his dream is to add a second story to the campus.”