PATRICIA MAE P.

MAYOR August 24, 2018

HUME 103 - G

UNIVERSAL ACESS TO QUALITY TERTIARY EDUCATION ACT (RA 10931):

A Reflection Paper

The Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act, otherwise known as the Republic Act
No. 10931 (RA 10931), caters to our constitutionally guaranteed right to quality education. Its
philosophical concept roams around the State’s duty to protect and promote the rights of all
Filipino people to free, quality, and accessible education at all levels which is explicitly stated in
the 1987 Republic of the Philippines Constitution. Since time immemorial, the State has provided
sufficient national and local public schools for every Filipinos primary and secondary education
(pre-school to high school) but despite this there has always been a lack of providing free access
to tertiary education that even those universities classified as State Universities and Colleges
(SUCs) collect matriculation. This problem has been long grieved for by the students studying in
SUCs as there was constant budget cuts to the funding for education that caused the tuition fees in
SUCs continue to spike up in the past decade. The year 2017 was a fruitful year to every Filipino
student, since it was the year that the RA 10931 was signed by President Rodrigo Duterte, the
constant struggle and fight of the students has been finally addressed. Although, this was just a
step forward to fully attain what we so call Free, Quality, and Accessible Education for all.

The government flaunts the RA 10931 as its solution to the needs of every Filipino student,
especially the poor. Contrary to this claim, the bill has served to aggravate our misery with its
product, its own Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR). With its passage, students of SUCs
have repeatedly faced problems due to the lack of funds but have likewise faced additional fees in
other aspects of their studies. The bill’s IRR even has a provision which exempts other Filipino
students from attaining the benefits of the bill.

By RA 10931’s essence, the budget appropriated for the bill should serve as the alternative to the
collection of matriculation from the students. The SUCs ask for their budget from the Commission
on Higher Education (CHED) and Department of Budget and Management (DBM) in order to
receive their appropriate funding. What this has done is excessively and unnecessarily delayed the
arrival of the funds to the point that many of the students’ needs cannot be provided by the
University, or so I have observed. It comes to show that even the process of this policy is
bureaucratic and slow up to the point that it hinders the students to attain the education they
rightfully deserve. When you look into the direct effect of the bill in our university, the University
of the Philippines Los Banos (UPLB), most of the students have been subject to unofficial fees
since according to the administration such fees are not covered by the bill. Ever since “education
became free”, the dormers of UPLB had to pay the maximum amount as the bracketing system
was deemed inoperative even if students still had to fill out online STS forms. Even NSTP classes
are barred from holding field trips due to a lack of funds or if they do hold a field trip students
should outsource money from their own pockets. Similarly, there are lab classes that ask for
contributions from its students just so their professors can purchase reagents for the students.
Student institutions have likewise been deprived of funding even if the student fee clearly is one
of the miscellaneous fees to be paid for by the bill. It is hence clear that RA 10931 has a lot of
problems that it needs to respond to, problems currently faced by the students under the
implementation of this policy. There are still a lot of gaps for improvement especially that even
the Commission on Audit (COA) itself flagged the low utilization rate of the P8-billion allocated
for the said law.

The bill has likewise betrayed its promise of helping poor Filipinos by further worsening the grief
of SUCs students. Even up until now, UPLB students under bracket E2 (Full Discount + Stipend)
have yet to receive their stipends for last midyear and last year they received their stipends after
the semester had ended. Not only that, the bill has also been used as an excuse to deprive students
applying for readmission or extension of residency a chance for reentry into the university. A year
into its implementation, it is apparent enough that its implementers have a lot to address and
troubleshoot. RA 10931 has become a tool for SUCs to withhold funding due to bureaucratic nature
of the acquisition of funds. As it stands, the bill continues to worsen the current state of the
education system, and ensures that the neoliberal framework survives through it.