• Real-time enlistment:
  April 8 and 9
• E-prerog:
  April 10 and 11
• First Day of classes:
  April 11
• Last day of classes:
  May 14

• Registration Period:
  June 3-6
• First Day of Classes:
  June 10
• Last day of Classes:
  October 8

   Nakaraan

   Isang Daan

   Saang Daan?

Richelle is a first year student at the University of the Philippines Diliman. She is among the first batch of students affected by the approved 300% tuition and other fee increases. Her first semester alone cost her family P17,000 for 15 units.

She was unable to apply for the university's Socialized Tuition and Financial Assistance Program (STFAP), an incentive-granting scheme based on one's family income and expenditures, because her admission letter arrived late at her home in Palawan. Her parents, both already retired, were unable to procure income tax returns as required by the STFAP. To pay the P1,000 per unit rate, her parents resorted to borrowing from relatives and from 5-6 lenders - illegal loaners who demand P600 payment for every P500 borrowed - in their neighborhood.

And Richelle's plight is echoed by other freshmen.

"With education being our sector, kailangang sinusuri natin ang mga issues sa edukasyon," Alvin Peters, national president of the National Union of Students of the Philippines, urged the audience in a student-initiated forum last January 24.

The forum, which was held at the College of Mass Communication auditorium, was an Alternative Classroom Learning Experience (ACLE) organized by the League of Filipino Students-CMC and the Union of Journalists in the Philippines-UP with Peters and Student Regent James Mark Terry Ridon as speakers.

Titled "UP for Grabs", discussed in the ACLE were the state of the Philippine educational system and more specifically, the state of UP education.