A very expensive school
Administration officials of Airlink International Aviation College have retaliated against students whose parents complained to this columnist about the school’s illegal impositions on their children.
I wrote about the parents’ complaints against the school on March 15.
The school had obliged all its graduating students to go on a field trip to Cebu province and stay at a five-star hotel. For this, it charged them P28,000 each.
The amount was in addition to the P20,000 they had to pay for the graduation ball and P12,000 for the graduation fee.
All told, Airlink was asking P60,000 from each graduating student.
The parents had sought my help about the unnecessary fees.
“The fees are not only too much, they’re also illegal since they were not included in the fees listed during enrollment,” said one of them.
Before the parents came to me, they said they had confronted Airlink president Geronimo Amurao about the exactions.
According to them, Amurao didn’t listen to their complaints but instead narrated how he, a poor boy from Batangas province, became successful and built the school from scratch.
Amurao then reportedly called in the school’s legal counsel, Gerome Amurao, who couldn’t explain to the parents why the Cebu field trip was necessary and why Airlink was requiring each graduating student to pay P20,000 for the graduation ball.
The lawyer just kept saying, “Basta, magbayad na lang kayo (You must pay).”
I had advised the parents not to allow their children take part in the Cebu field trip since I agreed with them that the fees were unnecessary and illegal.
The school, however, retaliated against those who didn’t go on the Cebu tour by excluding them from the graduation rites and withholding their diplomas until each of them submitted a research paper.
And do you know the contents of the research paper?
Take a look: A comparative study of various airline flight safety programs from three international and three domestic airlines; comparative study on the efficiency of Philippine domestic and international airport operations based on financial analysis (cost and revenue), airport productivity and security measures, potential measures to improve efficiency; and the importance and relevance of the four pillars of safety management.
The students who took a two-year course in aircraft mechanic are being asked to submit a paper like the one required for a PhD in Aviation Management, that is, if there is such a course!
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The elder brother of a female justice of the Supreme Court has absconded with at least P18 million from a company where he is a partner.
“He wasn’t like that until his sister became [SC justice],” said one of his business partners.
Instead of protecting his sister, this man is putting her to shame.
