Long-time UP Foundation, Inc. (UPFI) executive director and business administration professor Gerardo Agulto Jr. passed away on March 10. 

A professor at the UP Diliman (UPD) Cesar E.A. Virata School of Business (VSB), Agulto was widely known as the UPFI executive director, having held the post from August 2001 until May 31, 2021.

At the VSB, Agulto taught graduate and undergraduate courses in financial management, management of financial institutions, and accounting and control from 1988 until 2012. As director of Master of Business Administration (1992 – 2001) and Master of Science in Finance (1997 – 2001), he was responsible for the development and implementation of the academic and administrative activities of the two graduate programs.

Agulto was officer-in-charge from 1989 to 1991 back when the VSB was the UPD College of Business Administration.

In 2013, Agulto was invited to teach classes under the UPD Extension Programs in Pampanga and Olangapo’s (UPDEPPO) Master of Management Program as a professorial lecturer. There, he revised and revitalized the graduate program such that he had been acknowledged as its “Father” and instrumental in preventing its impending phaseout.

According to Prof. Julieta C. Mallari, PhD, former UPDEPPO director, “his authority, erudition, and competence also figured prominently in his instruction — without intimidating his students. On the contrary, they were drawn to him for his sheer brilliance and wit, let alone his fatherly concern and munificence of heart. The magic fiber of his being is most memorable: cultivating the life of the mind as well as giving heart to the UPDEPPO community.”

A certified public accountant and real estate broker, Agulto, at various stages, served as a member of the governing boards of corporations. Agulto was president and board chairman of the Country Bank of Taguig (1994 – 2004), senior vice president of the Philippine National Bank (1982 – 1987), and general manager of the National Investment and Development Corporation (1979 – 1981).He earned his master’s (business administration) and bachelor’s (business administration) degrees from UPD in 1974 and 1963, respectively.