Climbing the Olympus

By: Ian Fiedalan

My heart goes out to students of Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP). With about 65,000 enrollees, the PUP administration looks for a patch of it's finances through tuition fee increase from P12 to P176. This bold step provokes activists and concerned alliances in the community to prevent such imposition. It's not unknown to many that the university caters to students of poor families. These students came not only from urban poor of Manila and its suburbs, but from those students in provinces who wished to enroll and access above standard education as well. Further, the state university offers an array of technical and complete courses making it as one of the choices among public school of higher learning.

I firmly stand to uphold the rights of our youth to have fair access to basic rights which include education. It is our government's obligation to give priority to education as enshrined in Section 17, Article I of the Constitution. How would we be able to accelerate social progress when we are denying the very right which would lead to this goal? This negates the provision that our State shall protect and promote the right of the citizens to quality education at all levels.. (Section 1, Article XIV, 1987 Constitution).

I spent a year in PUP- College of Engineering and Architecture. The scenarios are haunting me still. A humid air depleted my breathing (inadequate ventilation in classrooms). A rocking chair in my minor class which was so irritating. A small size classrooms in main building. And who would have forgotten the most rigid steps in school enrollment that only PUP could offer (took me two days, 11 counting-steps and over a hundred yards of walk in different segments of the campus, unimaginable!)? I have fair shot of all these struggles during my freshman year.

If indeed PUP needs face lift, big chunk of the funds shall go to physical facilities like chairs and fixtures of classrooms, and not to physical landscaping or garden make-overs. While the arguments of the administration are likely acceptable as they say the meager budget it receives from the national government is insufficient and thus a valid recourse is to increase tuition fees; but prudent mind would dictates us that at this economic distress we are all experiencing, to burden our students with fees which are beyond the latter's financial standing is like saying in their faces: you are not welcome here in our school, you poor creature!

Our leaders should review their commitments to education policy as per constitutional instructions. I am not dismissing the idea that deep in their heart, our government people desire nothing but goodness to all. To the school administrators, tuition fee hike is not a viable solution to fiscal inadequacy. To our youth, especially those students who have balls to fight for their rights and actively hurdles challenges, my prayers and sympathy.