www.nordis.net

BAGUIO CITY — University of the Philippines-Baguio changes its default fee from P600/unit to P1000/unit. The incumbent president of the university, Alfred Pascual, proposed the memo and will affect freshmen of this school year.

Millionaire Bracket

As of the 300% increase of tuition in the university, the Socialized Tuition and Financial Assistance Program of the UP system has continue aiding the students with financial incapacity to pursue their college education.

The STFAP’s bracketing system has particularized each student’s financial capability to a specific bracket. Namely, A (1000/unit); B (600/unit); C (400/unit); D (200/unit); E1 (subsidized tuition) and E2 (subsidized tuition plus allowance).

With the changing of the default bracket, freshmen with no documents of their parents’ Income Tax Return will be automatically under bracket A, tagged as the millionaire bracket, and will pay P18,000 per semester (for a regular load of 18 units).

No longer a state university

In line with the changed default of the STFAP bracket, a hearing was launched last June 22, 2011 in the university for the students to be cleared of the issue. Facilitated by the University Student Council, the administration had the chance the students’ sentiments.

One of the student’s concerns was there’s no student representative when the memo was being proposed. UP Baguio administration responded as the memo is not a change in the STFAP policy, but as a change in the defaults alone and that a student representative need not be present.

Furthermore, an ITR and Certificate of Indigency are both not enough to determine a student’s financial capacity. This concern of the students, however, was not justified.

“This changing of the default bracket masks just another tuition fee increase,” said Kabataan Party List Representative Maica Quitain, also a student of UP Baguio. “The 600/unit had already discouraged a significant number of UPCAT passers to enroll in the university. Applying a higher bracket only implicates that this is no longer a state university for students who will study here surely afford the increase in fee.” # CEGP Release