University students protesting shortage of rooms

Manila TimesMakati CityStudents held a protest on Thursday night at Quezon Hall of University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City, seeking solutions to shortage of dormitories at the state school.Dorm slots for UP students have been unavailable since August 3, the start of the school year at the government university.In the meantime, the students were given temporary shelters in the old office of the UP workers union.Some of them camped out and made the Sunken Garden their temporary home while others were adopted by friends who already have dorm rooms.Still others spent time at commercial establishments operating 24/7.A slot in a UP dorm can cost around P2,000 a month including meals.Some dorms, however, are semi-private like the Acacia and Centennial residence halls, which charge P1,500 a month, excluding meals and electricity.Michael Tan, UP-Diliman chancellor, held a dialogue with the students also on Thursday.He said they have processed only 186 of the 300 appeals made by the students seeking dorm slots.Some of the appeals were from those looking for accommodation in lower-priced dormitories, with UP charging higher rates for its newer dormitories.Tan admitted that it will take time to solve the dorm shortage.“We are calling on UP alumni who may want to donate a whole dorm,” Tan was quoted as saying in a report by ABS-CBN.Representative Terry Ridon of Kabataan party-list, in a statement, expressed alarm not only over the dormitory issue but also that on registration hounding the opening of classes in the flagship campus of the University of the Philippines.“UP charges the highest tuition among all public state universities. Yet UP students are not exempt from class opening woes, such as the lack of dormitories and shortages in the number of offered classes. We call on the UP administration to immediately act on these issues. Paying high tuition and school fees is already a heavy burden for students and their families. The least the UP administration could do is to provide efficient service to all students. What is happening right now is far from being efficient,” Ridon, a former UP student regent, said.Student groups earlier pointed out that a major cause of the dorm shortage is the sharp increase in the number of freshmen accepted by the university.About 3,563 freshmen students are enrolled for the current semester, up from the 2,723 last school year.The spike in the number of accepted students may be linked to the university’s preparations for the implementation of the K to 12 Senior High School Program next year.Science Secretary Mario Montejo said the number of slots for undergraduate scholarship has more than tripled in five years, jumping from 1,250 in 2010 to 5,595 in 2015.“We’re also now preparing the groundwork for recruiting new partner universities and introducing innovations into the program for us to expand by 100% in 2017, on our way to meet the required critical number of scientists,” Montejo said in his keynote speech at “In Touch with Excellence,” part of the recent National Science and Technology Week.According to him, the DOST has also produced an average of 350 Master’s and 35 PhD graduates in priority science and engineering courses annually.“Since 2010, we have been strengthening and enhancing our S&T ecosystem, an ecosystem that empowers our scientists and engineers to come up with innovative ideas to improve productivity, enhance delivery of government services and address the most pressing concerns of [everyday Filipino woman] Aling Maria and [everyday Filipino man] Mang Juan,” he said.The science secretary added that the most critical component of this ecosystem is its human resources, and their number is critical for the Philippines to become a “Science Nation” able to sustain its development.“You are blessed with intelligence,” Montejo said, addressing the scholars in the audience. “It’s only proper to use this God-given intelligence to explore and understand nature. Whatever God created in nature is for our benefit. Let us use this for our country’s own good.”Meanwhile, Ernest Nathan Nogales, a scholar who graduated summa cum laude from the state-run University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City with a degree in chemical engineering and one of the honorees, rallied his fellow DOST scholars to “think about serving the people, not out of duty but out of love. I assure you there is lasting happiness there.”In his speech, Nogales reminded them that some areas in the country remain marginalised—with no electricity, among others.On the other hand, DOST undersecretary for scientific and technological services Rowena Cristina Guevara called on the scholars to venture in entrepreneurship while completing their dissertation or thesis.The University of the Philippines Diliman campus.