‘UP tuition hike targets rich students’

Only incoming freshmen and transferees who belong to the "high-income bracket" will be affected by the 300 percent tuition increase approved by the University of the Philippines, a UP official said.

Isabela Reyes, director of the UP System’s Information Office, said in a statement that the adjustment — the first since 1989 — was approved during a Board of Regents meeting held the other night. She said it was approved to help the university cope with inflation.

"The adjusted fees are nowhere near the true cost of an undergraduate UP education, not to mention the cost of an undergraduate in other comparable universities in the country," she said.

Reyes also stressed that the tuition hike will only be applied to transferees and freshmen belonging to the high-income bracket who will enter the university starting in 2007.

UP students who support the increase, when interviewed, said only freshmen and transferees whose families have an annual income of P1 million will be affected by the tuition hike.

Reyes also said that contrary to claims of those opposing the increase that no consultations were held, a series of consultations with students in UP campuses in Baguio, Cebu, Tacloban and Mindanao was conducted.

"The deans of UP Manila also held consultations with their students on various occasions and (UP) president Emerlinda Roman herself responded to all requests for interviews (with) the (student publications) UP Collegian and the UP (Los Baños) Perspective," Reyes said.

The Board of Regents, at its 1,216th meeting, unanimously approved the other night Roman’s recommendation to adjust and implement a revised Socialized Tuition and Financial Assistance Program (STFAP).

The board took note of the various position papers for and against Roman’s recommendation that were submitted by various student and faculty groups before deciding on the issue.

Reyes said Roman noted that the students were not united against the proposed tuition hike because some student councils and student groups endorsed the proposal.

However, the All-UP Academic Employees Union said in an earlier statement that the approval of the tuition hike is actually a "creeping commercialization" that is a prelude to privatization, which is what is happening to many government-run and controlled corporations.

"We are reiterating our vehement objection to the creeping commercialization of our university as exemplified, among other things, in an increase in tuition and other fees as the usual practice in private schools," the group said.