‘Bill seeking free tertiary education could be passed this year’

Senator Bam Aquino has expressed confidence that a bill that seeks to provide free education to all students in State Colleges and Universities (SUCs) would be passed within a year.

“We’re quite hopeful that this will pass. Mahalaga na mabigyan ng tulong ang ating mahihirap na estudyante sa SUCs. Marami sa amin ang talagang tinutulak ito,” Aquino, chairman of the Senate committee on education, said after its hearing on the measure on Wednesday.

The committee, he said, will hold several technical working group meetings to iron out and consolidate provisions of the different measures and come up with a version that would “truly help poor students who want to finish college.”

“I think we owe it to our students to go through a tedious process to refine the bill. But I’m confident that we can get this done within a year,” the senator said.

During the hearing, Aquino said several sectors pushed different methods to implement the measure, some want to focus on courses that students would take while others believe that it should be based on the student’s capacity to pay.

Different groups, he said, also raised the possibility of expanding the measure’s coverage by providing poor students with miscellaneous expenses, transportation expenses and living expenses, in addition to a free tuition.

Aside from improving access to tertiary education, the senator said he would also work to improve the quality of education in SUCs.

“Just because we’re working on this bill, hindi ibig sabihin kakalimutan na natin ang kalidad. We have to ensure quality as well as access,” he said. “Kung itutulak mo ito (free tuition fee) plus magsabay ka ng intervention sa kalidad, mas gaganda ang quality ng SUCs.”

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian challenged critics of the bill to produce “credible data” to justify their opposition to the measure.

“My team and I have undertaken rigorous research to present clear facts and figures in support of our free higher education advocacy. Unfortunately, opponents of our advocacy have not done their homework,” said Gatchalian, advocate of free college education and vice chair of the committee.

The senator specifically called on representatives of private higher education institutions (HEIs) to provide evidence in support of claims that the tuition-free policy would result in a mass migration of students from private HEIs to SUCs.

READ: Exodus from private to public schools seen if SUCs fully subsidized

“Critics have been portraying the passage of the Free Higher Education Act as an apocalyptic scenario for private HEIs. These stakeholders need to offer us more than mere conjecture and speculation if they want us to give weight to their arguments,” Gatchalian said. CDG/rga