TL;DR: St. Scholastica's College Tacloban is a health sciences college first and a general one second. It runs BS Nursing, BS Pharmacy, BS Psychology and BS Medical Laboratory Science, plus a Human Services department, and its senior high school is organised into two clusters — HEALERS and CREATE — that feed straight into those courses. The one published fee is a PHP 8,000.00 initial downpayment at enrollment. The campus is in Palo, Leyte, not in Tacloban proper.
Most colleges add health programmes because they are in demand. This one was built the other way round: it exists because a hospital ran short of nurses.
The Missionary Benedictine Sisters of Tutzing had administered Divine Word Hospital in Tacloban since 1965. When Divine Word University of Tacloban closed in June 1995, the hospital's pipeline of trained nurses closed with it. In 1999 the sisters, led by Sr. Eloisa L. David OSB with lay partners Dr. Antonio E. Lim Jr., Dr. Cleta M. Salvatierra and Mrs. Evelina M. Acebedo, ran a feasibility study, leased the former DWU Janssen building from the SVD Fathers, and filed with CHED in October 1999. On April 11, 2000, St. Scholastica's College of Health Sciences got its permit to open first year in Biology, Medical Technology, Nursing and Pharmacy.
That origin still shapes what the school offers today.
The college programs
| Program | Department | Leads toward |
|---|---|---|
| BS Nursing | College of Nursing | PRC Nurse Licensure Examination |
| BS Pharmacy | Pharmacy Department | PRC Pharmacist Licensure Examination |
| BS Medical Laboratory Science | Medical Laboratory Science Department | PRC Medical Technologist Licensure Examination |
| BS Psychology | Psychology Department | Psychometrician licensure, graduate study, HR and research roles |
| Human Services | Human Services Department | Community, welfare and support-services roles |
The first three are the health sciences core. All three end in a PRC licensure examination, and all three carry laboratory and clinical practicum components, which is why the school publishes separate hospital affiliation pages for Nursing and for Medical Laboratory Science. If you are weighing one against another, our BS Nursing guide and the nursing versus medical technology comparison set out how the day-to-day work and the job markets differ, which matters more than the entrance requirements do.
Psychology sits slightly apart. It leads to the psychometrician licensure examination at bachelor level and to graduate study for anyone wanting to practise as a psychologist, and it is the one programme here where a large share of graduates end up outside clinical work entirely.
Human Services appears on the school's published departmental contact list with its own number, alongside the four degree departments. It is the least documented of the five on the website, so treat it as a programme to ask about directly rather than one you can research online.
The school also runs a full basic education department: grade school, junior high school and senior high school.
The senior high school is a feeder, and it says so
Most senior high schools list strands. SSCT publishes something more specific: one Academic track organised into two named clusters, which it calls the Strengthened Senior High School Program.
HEALERS
- H — Health Professionals (Nursing)
- E — Educators in Science
- A — Applied Science Careers
- L — Laboratory Experts (Medical Technologists)
- E — Experts in Pharmacy
- R — Registered Medical Practitioners
- S — Scientific Innovators
CREATE
- C — Civil Engineering
- R — Runway and Aviation Careers
- E — Electrical Engineering
- A — Architecture
- T — Information Technology
- E — Engineering Systems (Mechanical, Industrial and Geodetic)
Read HEALERS as the school's own pipeline: five of its seven destinations map onto degrees SSCT itself offers. CREATE is the honest opposite — none of those six lead to a programme on this campus, so a CREATE student is being prepared to leave for university elsewhere.
That is useful rather than a criticism. It tells you what the school is confident teaching, and it tells a Grade 10 student which cluster keeps them on one campus through to a licence. If your child is aiming at nursing, our guide to which strand to take for nursing explains what the strand actually changes about the college years.
What enrollment costs and how it runs
The school publishes its enrollment procedure step by step, including one real number.
College, new students and transferees
- Department chairperson, for evaluation and advisement — the chairpersons sit in separate rooms by programme, so know which one you need before you arrive
- GIYA Wellness Center, for encoding of student information
- Registrar's Office, for the student number, subject encoding, submission of requirements and the enrollment form
- Business Office — PHP 8,000.00 initial downpayment
- IT Office, for the ID pictorial, learning management system and institutional email registration
- Student Affairs Office, for ID validation
- Registrar's Office again, to surrender the enrollment form and receive the load slip
The school is blunt about the last step: no load slip means not officially enrolled. Do not leave the campus after paying and assume you are done.
Basic education follows a shorter five-step version through the same offices, with the same PHP 8,000.00 initial downpayment at the Business Office.
The PHP 8,000 figure is a downpayment, not the tuition. The website does not publish a per-unit rate, a per-semester total or the payment schedule for the balance. Ask the Business Office for the full breakdown before you pay anything, and ask specifically what the laboratory fees are for your programme, since health sciences laboratory fees are usually the largest single line after tuition.
Dates and documents
For school year 2026-2027 the school published college entrance examinations on seven June dates: June 2 at 9:00 AM and 1:00 PM, then June 10, 13, 17, 20, 24 and 27 at 9:00 AM. Basic education had a last day of admission of June 6, opening of classes June 8, and last day of enrollment June 13. College classes opened July 27. Those are that year's dates; confirm the current ones with the GIYA Wellness Center.
To sit the college entrance exam: filled-out form, two 2x2 ID pictures with a blue background, transcript of records for transferees, and the entrance examination fee.
At enrollment, to the registrar: Form 138 for senior high graduates, or a certificate of transfer with an informative copy of the transcript for transferees; original PSA live birth certificate; original certificate of good moral character; four 2x2 pictures with a blue background; a medical certificate with results for X-ray, urinalysis, stool exam and CBC; and a long thick brown envelope.
Book the medical tests early. Four results on one certificate takes more than a single walk-in visit.
Who each programme actually suits
The four degree programmes look similar from outside — all health-adjacent, all in the same building, three of them ending in a PRC licence. In practice they filter for different people.
BS Nursing is the one with the heaviest clinical exposure and the clearest overseas pathway, and also the one with the most demanding related learning experience hours. It suits students who are comfortable with patients, shift work and physical stamina.
BS Medical Laboratory Science is laboratory work rather than bedside work. Same health sector, very different day. Students who like precision, protocols and instruments but do not want to be the person delivering bad news usually prefer it, and the school's separate training and research laboratory page suggests it has invested there.
BS Pharmacy sits between the two: patient-facing in community practice, technical in hospital and industry practice. The school's own framing leans on the WHO eight-star pharmacist model, which signals a clinical rather than a purely retail orientation.
BS Psychology is the one degree here that does not commit you to healthcare at all. Graduates take the psychometrician licensure examination, move into human resources, research or education, or continue to graduate study. If a student is interested in people but unsure about clinical work, it is the least-narrowing choice on the list.
The honest question to ask each department chairperson at step one of enrollment: how many of last year's graduates are working in the field the degree is for. That answer, not the brochure, is what tells you whether the programme is doing its job.
Two things worth checking yourself
The location. The school is named for Tacloban and its catchment is Tacloban, but the campus sits on Maharlika Highway in Barangay Campetic, Palo, Leyte — the next municipality south. That is a daily commute for a Tacloban-based student, so cost it in.
The licensure record. The school maintains Board Placers pages for Medical Laboratory Science and Psychology and a Board Passers page for Pharmacy. A placers list names individuals; it is not a passing rate. For a licensure-track degree, the number you want is the percentage of first-time takers who passed, by year. Ask the department chairperson for it in writing. Our roundup of board exam performance by nursing school shows how much that figure varies between institutions, and it is the single most useful comparison you can make.
Then set it against other schools in the Tacloban area before you commit.
Sources
- St. Scholastica's College Tacloban — College Admission procedure and requirements, SY 2026-2027 (ssctacloban.edu.ph/admission/college)
- St. Scholastica's College Tacloban — Basic Education Admission procedure and Strengthened Senior High School Program (ssctacloban.edu.ph/admission/basic-education)
- St. Scholastica's College Tacloban — History (ssctacloban.edu.ph/about-us/history)
- St. Scholastica's College Tacloban — Nursing, Pharmacy, Psychology and Medical Laboratory Science department pages (ssctacloban.edu.ph)
- St. Scholastica's College Tacloban — home page and contact details (ssctacloban.edu.ph)
