PNoy signs law making poor students priority in scholarships, loans

President Benigno Aquino III has recently signed into law a proposal from Congress aimed to improve the access to quality tertiary education by prioritizing poor but deserving students in state-funded college scholarships and loans.

Republic Act No. 10687, signed into law on October 15, provides for a comprehensive and Unified Student Financial Assistance System for Tertiary Education or UniFAST.

“The existing publicly-funded national government programs for Scholarships, Grants-in-Aid, and Student Loans for Tertiary Education are hereby unified and harmonized to improve their efficiency and to ensure that deserving Filipinos are given equitable access to educational opportunities,” RA 10687 said.

A student enrolling in tertiary education, whether in public, private, national or local institutions, can avail of any one or more of the said modalities of the student financial assistance program (StuFAP).

Senator Juan Edgardo Angara, principal author of the bill, said the government had in place up to 62 StuFAPs across 17 agencies. Though some programs performed relatively well, he said, majority had low coverage.

More worrisome, Angara said, was a study conducted by the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) that showed that the StuFAPs were “increasingly enjoyed by student beneficiaries from high income families.”

Under the new law, beneficiaries under the Iskolar ng Bayan Act, or the top 10 graduates of every public high school, will be prioritized in the provision of government-funded scholarships, while students belonging to poor families and marginalized sectors can easily avail of the grants-in-aid.

RA 10687 also creates a UniFAST Board to be chaired by the CHED, and co-chaired by the secretary of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) and director general of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA).

Ex-officio members include the secretary of the Department of Education, and representatives from the Department of Labor and Employment, National Economic and Development Authority and the National Youth Commission.

The board shall formulate and approve the policies and strategies concerning the three modalities of the StuFAP.

In a statement, CHED hailed the passage of the UniFAST law as a “landmark social legislation” of the Aquino administration benefiting the Filipino youth. —Kathrina Charmaine Alvarez/KBK, GMA News