Kabataan Partylist Representative Raymond Palatino today welcomed Commission on Higher Education (CHED) Chair Patricia Licuanan’s vow to instill reforms in the higher education sector.

“We look forward to Licuanan’s promise of reforms. We hope that she is up to the task of facing the education crisis head-on,” Palatino said.

Palatino said that to genuinely enact positive changes in the CHED, Licuanan should address yearly tuition and other fee increases and work to make the agency more accessible to students.

“The CHED must practice stronger regulatory powers over the unjust imposition of tuition and other fee hikes. Policies such as CHED Memorandum 13, for instance, need to be reviewed and updated.”

CMO 13 does not include miscellaneous fees in the yearly tuition consultations of private higher educational institutions. In effect, school administrations are given free reign to arbitrarily increase miscellaneous fees either as smokescreen for tuition hikes or on top of tuition rates.

He added, “CHED must also uphold public higher education. Over the years, state colleges and universities (SUCs) have suffered the worst budget cuts resulting in commercialization, privatization and other income-generating ventures at the expense of our poor students.”

“Increase in state subsidy for SUCs should be CHED’s top priority. We hope Licuanan would take up the cudgels for higher state subsidy for education in the 2011 national budget deliberations, ” Palatino said.
Palatino is calling for the allocation of six (6) percent of the Gross Domestic Product to education as prescribed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

“We also hope that Licuanan develops CHED into a more pro-student institution that would uphold freedom of speech and expression of students. Until now, not all tertiary schools have their own student councils and campus publications. These institutions are basic rights of students,” he said.

Working to make CHED more accessible to students, he said, would be a major positive development since the CHED Chairman is automatically represented in all Board of Regents of state colleges and universities.

“Lastly, there should be no conflict of interest. She should not dilly-dally in imposing sanctions against school-owners in violation of rules and regulations governing tuition and other fee hikes and other policies. The main problem with previous CHED administrations was their links and bias towards school owners and capitalist educators,” he said.

Palatino also urged Licuanan to support calls to amend laws such as the Education Act of 1982 and Campus Journalism Act of 1991 and review past administrations’ labor export program in relation to the orientation of the educational system.

He said that the Education Act of 1982 “allows school-owners to arbitrarily raise tuition to their discretion”, the CJA of 1991 “has closed down campus publications since its implementation,” and the government’s labor export program “induces higher educational institutions to adjust their curriculum to one-sidedly cater to demands of the global market, driving away our nurses, doctors, teachers and professionals instead of urging them to contribute to national development.”

“We are open to a dialogue with Chair Licuanan to discuss pertinent issues and our proposal for policy reforms in the education sector,” Palatino said. ###