Immaculate Conception Academy-Greenhills - History

History

ICA traces its foundation in 1933-1936 when the Chinese families in Binondo requested the MIC sisters to open a school so that their children who have been baptized in the Catholic Church could be followed up in the practice of living out of their faith. The school moved seven times to accommodate its growing population, partly due to influx of Chinese immigrants escaping the Sino-Japanese War as well as the damage of school buildings as a result of the shelling of Manila by the Americans and the Japanese during World War II.

The close ties between ICA and its neighboring exclusive school for boys and co-member of the EDSA-Ortigas Consortium (EDSOR), Xavier School, that can be seen today can be traced to the 1950s. At the invitation of the Jesuits who were then building Xavier School in 1958 in the newly opened subdivision in Greenhills, the MIC Sisters also constructed a building that was completed in 1960; thus, the Sisters were ready to receive the Chinese-Filipino students from ICA-Intramuros, which continued to operate the elementary department and kindergarten. In 1975, ICA-Intramuros was fused with ICA-Greenhills. At present ICA-Greenhills has a population of 3,381 with 1,009 in the high school department.

Originally, ICA was considered an Anglo-Chinese school with a double curriculum (Chinese and English). In 1954, ICA became a Filipino school offering the Chinese Language Arts program as an essential part of the curriculum. While majority of the student population is Filipino-Chinese, Chinese heritage is not a main criterion for admission to ICA; a majority of ICA's students have fathers, siblings and other male relatives who are studying or have matriculated from Xavier School. ICA undertook the accreditation process of Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges and Universities or PAASCU in SY 1983-84 and received full-accredited status in 1986. It was reaccredited in 1989, 1994, 1999 and 2004. In late 2009, the High School Department was granted a top-tier Level III Accreditation by the Federation Accrediting Agencies of the Philippines (FAAP).