Senator Win Gatchalian expressed concern on Thursday, Nov. 25 over qualified students being denied admission because of limited capacities of State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) despite steadily increasing allocations for the implementation of Republic Act No. 10931 or the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act also known as the free higher education law.

Gatchalian, who is co-author and co-sponsor of the free higher education law, cited his consultations with presidents of SUCs where he mentioned that some students who already passed admission exams end up not enrolling because some SUCs do not have enough classrooms, facilities, laboratories, and teachers, among others, to accommodate the students.

He pointed out that the participation rate in higher education in the Philippines could have been higher if the barrier of capacity had been removed. He also cited data from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) Institute of Statistics, wherein it is stated that the Philippines ranks fourth at 41 percent among Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries in terms of higher education participation rate, including enrollment in Technical-Vocational Education and Training (TVET) programs.

“Not all of those who pass the admission exams actually go to college and it’s not their fault. Nakakapanghinayang na maraming mga deserving at qualified na mga mag-aaral ang hindi makapasok sa kolehiyo dahil lang sa kakulangan sa kapasidad ng ibang mga paaralan (It's disappointing that there are a lot of deserving and qualified students who have not entered college due to the lack of capacity of schools),” Gatchalian said during his interpellation of the Commission on Higher Education’s (CHED) 2022 budget last month.

While Gatchalian acknowledged that SUCs’ capital outlay did not increase commensurately to the budget of free higher education, he emphasized the need to have a roadmap to address capacity issues.

Since data is not readily available, Gatchalian asked the CHED to submit to the Senate the number of affected students because of limited SUC’s capacity.

“Student population is growing but I think it can still grow if we can address capacity issues. I would like to urge the Commission to look at this. It’s not going to be solved overnight but at least we can see a target that we can work on in the next few years,” he said.

From P38 billion in 2020, the budget for the free higher education law increased to P44 billion in 2021. Under the 2022 proposed national budget, the law is allotted an amount of P46 billion.

Under the Free Higher Education program, 1.6 million students from 114 SUCs and 106 Local Universities and Colleges (LUCs) no longer pay tuition and miscellaneous fees. There are 436,000 students who benefit from the Tertiary Education Subsidy (TES). An additional 258,000 also benefit from the Tulong Dunong program.