Tragic cost of education

It was a senseless loss of life but the suicide of University of the Philippines (UP) Manila student Kristel Tejada is but a symptom of a larger crisis besetting the country’s entire educational system.

State funding is inadequate and change is slow to take place.

In response to Tejada’s suicide, the UP administration came out with a decision to lift the “no late payment” policy that prevented students from attending classes in the event they failed to pay the tuition for a specific semester.

The decision came after a dialogue with faculty and student leaders which UP Manila chancellor Manuel Agulto, the man responsible for rejecting Tejada’s loan application, described as “civil.”

The dialogue was “civil” after militant youth groups were barred from joining and reporters were restricted from asking about the Tejada case, only being allowed to enter the administration office to cover the school’s announcement.

The lifting of the policy, while too late to prevent Tejada’s death, should spur the state university to speed up promised reforms in its scholarship and student loan programs.

How ironic that the suicide occurred, according to UP President Federico Pascual, a day after he instructed chancellors at a council meeting “that we should not deny access to qualified students who cannot enroll because of financial constraints.”

He said reforms to simplify the STFAP application process and increase financial aid for poor students were planned for action by the Board of Regents next month.

“It is unfortunate it takes time to implement change. We can easily be overtaken, as we have been, by a sudden turn of events,” he said.

The outrage expressed over Tejada’s death is particularly sharp because of the state university’s heavy government subsidy. UP and its tradition – or obligation – of producing the “iskolar ng bayan” is supposed to have a greater sensitivity for shaping students from the less advantaged sector who show academic merit and potential.

Public anger is also high because it’s a familiar experience in private schools as well to see students turned away at exam time because they were unable to complete installment payments, which are strategically timed for exam periods.

What can be done is to invest more in student loan programs and full scholarships that give qualified beneficiaries a clear shot at finishing their degree.

Options should be available for a student who is already humiliated by rejection and the stress of scraping together funds midway in a semester to be able to continue a course already started.

This is a burden no student, much less Tejada, should suffer alone.

The 1987 Philippine Constitution mandates free education in grade school and high school for all students. It’s a different story for tertiary education, where famlies bear the full cost. For state-run universities and colleges, a shrinking government pie of resources forces each unit to make tough choices for survival. The policies, however, should always keep in mind a compassion for deserving students from the bottom of the economic pyramid.