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BY PRINCE GOLEZ
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Monday, March 19, 2018
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MANILA – Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III was pushing for the reduction of fees for college entrance exams.
Pimentel urged schools to consider lowering such “prohibitive” fees major universities charge applicants.
“It is understandable for these kids to want to have options when it comes to college, and naturally their parents want to give them the opportunities,” he said yesterday.
“But if applying at one school requires a P500 fee, then applying to four, five schools can be quite expensive,” Pimentel said.
State universities like the University of the Philippines (UP) and the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) charge entrance test fees similar to private schools but have thousands more applicants, he claimed.
“Around 80,000 students apply to UP each year while roughly 60,000 take the PUP college entrance exam annually,” Pimentel noted.
In addition, Pimentel proposed a standardized test for K-12 graduates acceptable to all tertiary education institutions to eliminate the need for schools to administer their own entrance exams.
“At present all students in the grade 6, 10 and 12 levels are given the National Achievement Test,” he said.
“If this is considered insufficient to provide Philippine college admission offices with a means by which to assess applicants, then I encourage our educators to work together to come up with something akin to the United States’ SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) and ACT (American College Testing) so that parents need not spend for so many entrance exams,” said Pimentel.
The SAT and the ACT are standardized tests given to junior and senior high school students in the United States.
In a related development, the Unified Student Financial Assistance System for Tertiary Education (UniFAST) Board has completed the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) for the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act.
Sen. Juan Edgardo Angara said the Free College law covers not only tuition but also other school expenses.
“Our students can finally enjoy the benefits under the free college law starting next school year,” he said.
“Bukod sa libreng matrikula at miscellaneous fees, may dagdag tulong pinansyal ito para sa mga mahihirap na mag-aaral para sa gastusin sa mga libro, pamasahe, dorm, at iba pa,” said the author of the Free College and the UniFAST laws.
The Commission on Higher Education was scheduled to present the IRR on March 26./PN
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