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U.P.
protests 300% tuition hike
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IT
was December 15, the day of the annual Lantern Parade
of the University of the Philippines. The students
were restless. But not in anticipation of the annual
march.
On the same day, the U.P. Board of Regents was voting
on the proposed increase in university tuition.
Earlier, protests flared throughout the campus.
Several students stormed the U.P. Law Center, thinking
the Board of Regents was meeting there. During the
annual Oblation Run at noon, members of the fraternity
Alpha Phi Omega (APO) ran through the campus in
their birthday suits (but with their heads and faces
covered in bonnets) holding protest signs as they
streaked by.
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With
the campus in an agitated state, the Lantern Parade
set for late in the afternoon got the axe. Not wanting
their costumes to go to waste (and because this was
U.P., for goodness sake), a number of Fine Arts students
defied orders and marched on as planned, decked in
… well, you can see for yourself. They continued
a tradition that began in 1922 and took the occasion
to air their sentiments on the imminent hike in school
fees.
In the end, the Board of Regents approved a 300 %
increase in tuition and ruled that fees would be adjusted
yearly based on the “national inflation rate.”
The new rates are P1,000 per credit unit in U.P. Diliman
and Los Baños and P600 in the regional campuses.
The new rates will come into effect with the incoming
freshmen of the school year 2007-2008.
Critics have pointed out that both the increase and
the basis for it smack of commercialization because
fees are premised on market rates, just like private
schools. |
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Others,
however, view the adjustment as a long time in coming.
The last tuition increase was in 1989. The cost per
credit unit then was P300, the value of which has
shrunk to P98 in 2005. |
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| By
Ces Rodriguez |
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