UP system to collect tuition and other fees for AY 2017-2018

A memorandum issued by University of the Philippines (UP) President Danilo Concepcion on Tuesday, August 1, confirmed that the UP System will not see "tuition-free education" for the academic year 2017-2018.

Instead, students will undergo two rounds of assessment under the Socialized Tuition System (STS) and will be "providing financial support to students from low-income households."

The result of the assessment will be released "days before" August 25, the date set for the payment of tuition and other fees.

Concepcion clarified that the memorandum "supersedes all previous issuance."

Kabataan Party-list Representative Sarah Elago was quick to slam the decision, issuing a statement within the same day.

"This is a step backward in the fight for free education. The UP administration is clearly going the path of continued profiteering in UP through the collection of tuition and other school fees," she declared.

Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno also on Tuesday declared that the government cannot shoulder the cost of tuition-free tertiary education.

"We estimated the cost of this bill, it will cost us something around P100 billion, hindi po kaya ng gobyerno 'yan," Diokno told the members of the House Committee on Appropriations during the deliberations for the proposed P3.7-trillion national budget next year.

Elago in response called out Diokno's "neoliberal" tactics.

"Duterte’s economic managers, DBM Sec. Diokno, DOF Sec. Dominguez, and NEDA chief  Pernia, have exposed themselves as the prime movers of neoliberal policies in the Duterte regime. They have, through NEDA chief Pernia, deliberately denounced free tuition as an ‘attack on private schools’, and effectively exposed their ulterior interests in the profits of private schools. On the contrary, they are the ones attacking the youth’s right to education.

"Budget Sec. Diokno spewed out once again the old argument that the poor will not benefit from free tuition due to them being only a small portion of the SUC population. He clearly doesn’t know what he’s saying and completely misses the point that it is precisely because of continued profiteering in SUCs thru tuition and other fees collection that hinder the poor from enrolling in SUCs," Elago added.

The UP Diliman Student Council also called out Concepcion and the UP Administration and staged a protest on Wednesday.

"The decision of the president to impose payments upon students, despite the promises of free education by the Duterte administration, is a betrayal to the student body continuing to assert for their right to free, quality and accessible education," the Council said in a statement.

It was previously announced on July 12 that the UP System "has suspended has suspended collection of registration fees ... pending clearer guidelines on the implementation of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) Free Tuition 2017."

The ACT Teachers Party-list on July 27 noted that the provisions for free tuition in State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) has been removed from 2018 budget.

ACT Party-list Representative France Castro asserted that the Duterte administration should "substantially increase SUCs' budgets to ensure that what they offer is indeed quality education."

"But now we see that the President's promise to make higher education free is just a bigay-bawi," she said. —LA/KG, GMA News