MIRIAM DEFENSOR SANTIAGO
- Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago
- Senate Office:
- Rm. 521-A 5th Flr., GSIS Bldg., Financial Center, Roxas Blvd., Pasay City
- Trunk Lines: (632) 552-6601 to 70 loc. 5561 / 5562 / 5563
- Direct Lines: (632) 552-6693
- Telefax No.: (632) 552-6692
- Email: miriam@miriam.com.ph, senmds@yahoo.com, mdsmediabureau@yahoo.com
- Website:www.miriam.com.ph
Quezon City Office (Main Office):
4/F Narsan Bldg., 3 West Fourth St., West Triangle, 1104 Quezon City
Direct Lines: (632) 411-4380 / (632) 371-9156 / (632)372-4573
Telefax No.: (632) 374-3059
Miriam then flew to Metro Manila to take up law at UP Diliman. As a freshman in law school, she topped written examinations and was appointed editor-in-chief of the law school paper.
Miriam is best remembered in the state university for breaking a record of 50 years of male dominance, by topping the written examinations and getting appointed as the first female editor-in-chief of the nationally prominent student newspaper, the Philippine Collegian. Another record was that she twice received the Vinzons Achievement Award for excellence in student leadership. Another record was that she became the first female to win as Best Debater in the annual debate between UP Diliman and UP Manila law schools.
Miriam graduated Bachelor of Laws, cum laude, from the state university. She was valedictorian of her class at the UP Diliman campus. (At that time, there was an evening law school for working students at UP Manila).
After marriage, Miriam won the DeWitt Fellowship at the University of Michigan law school. Thus, she earned the degree Master of Laws after one year, and the degree Doctor of the Science of Jurisprudence, after only six months. Her grades qualified her for the prestigious Barbour Scholarship. Her doctoral dissertation, with Prof. William W. Bishop, Jr. as supervisor, was later published as Political Offences in International Law.
Not content with her law doctorate, Miriam later pursued postdoctoral studies in law at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Stanford, University of California, at Berkeley, and Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. She attended the Hague Academy of Public International Law at The Hague, Netherlands, and at Sophia University, Tokyo.
Already a senator, she finished with high grades the academic requirements for the degree, Master of Arts in Religious Studies, at the Maryhill School of Theology in Metro Manila.