SC Co-hosts Inter-School Tilt for Bands

Tugani UP Cebu Publication Date: [January 2007 Issue]

Blue plastic material encircled the perimeters of the UP Cebu College soccer field in time for the Nar-sing Interschool Band Showdown last January 6.

The plastic material was placed to prevent possible onlookers from free riding in watching the event.

The slight rainshwoer did not stop the Cebu Normal University (CNU) Nightingale Student Council and he UP Cebu Student Council from pushing through the event.

Although UP has no nursing course, SC Chairman Karlo Mongaya said that their decision to team up with CNU to hold an interschool Nursing event was “a good venue to develop unity among the students of Cebu City, whether Nursing students or not.”

In addition, Mongaya explained that it was partly an income generating project of the Student Council to finance their activities.

The band showdown started at about 6:00 pm and ended at about 1 am.

Among the guest bands who entertained the crowd in the concert were famed Bisrock performers such as Aggressive Audio, Phylum, Mantequilla and Indephums.

When asked if the concert was a success, Mongaya replied, “the UPVCC-SC considers the activity a success because we were able to reach out to other students.” By Jill Marie Duero

UP Students Leave Classes In Protest Of Tuition Hike

The Freeman - Cebu Publication Date: [Monday, January 29, 2007]

Hundreds of students in all campuses of the University of the Philippines boycotted their classes on Friday to protest the 300 percent increase in their tuition imposed by the UP Board of Regents (BOR) last December.

In UP Cebu College, the youth party-list group KABATAAN Party, together with other student organizations led by the Nagkahiusang Kusog sa Estudyante (NKE) and the Student Council, walked out of their classrooms to demand for the recall of tuition and other fee increases (TOFI).

All wearing red, more than a hundred-fifty students marched around the campus and burned a large effigy of a UP enrollment form to express disgust over the UP administration’ ’s trampling of the students” right to proper consultations on the such increase.

Karlo Mikhail Mongaya, KABATAAN-Cebu Information Officer and UP Cebu Student Council Chairman, said the tuition increase, which is in line with the Long Term Higher Education Development (LTHEDP) of 2001-2010, will lead to other tuition hikes in other state universities and colleges (SUCs).

“The present government” s grandplan for education is not merely the neglect of education as was the analysis of previous generations of students. What we now see is the out-and-out abandonment of the responsibility to provide accessible and quality education for all,” Mongaya said.

The youth leader condemned the anti-student LTHEDP, which pushed for, among others, the gigantic increases of fees in 70 percent of SUCs, making tuition equal to those of private schools, and the reduction of SUCs to 20 percent of its present number.

“TOFI is not merely a local UP issue. TOFI, which is a manifestation of state abandonment of education, is an issue of national scope that will definitely affect the future of the Filipino youth,” he said.

Meanwhile, NKE spokesperson and Student Council official Ralph Sanchez said the BOR’’s decision to have tuition “subsequently adjusted annually based on the national inflation rate” makes UP no different from private schools where education is treated as a privilege for those who can afford rather than as a basic right.

Sanchez said the BOR has shifted the burden of subsidizing the university” s expenses to the students and their parents, ending UP’’s thrust of providing a mass-oriented education. - Wenna A. Berondo

Campus Renewal Plan to Give UPV Cebu a New Look

UP Views Publication Date: [January 2007 Issue]

A major overhaul is now eyed for UPVCebu College’s landscape as UPVisayas officials discussed last October 18, 2006 the UPVCC Campus Renewal Plan.

This intends to make the college “more responsive to the needs of the region.” UP Pres. Emerlinda Roman’s advisers for infrastructure, Prof. Mary Ann Espina and Dean Christopher Espina of the UP Diliman College of Architecture, conceptualized the design and layout.

New infrastructures and facilities as well as “quality” programs for students will be some of the features once the said plan will be realized.

A Graduate Studies building with an estimated cost of P500,000 will rise behind the Administration Building. The present Arts and Sciences Building, meanwhile, is now under renovation, and will be used for its original purpose as a dormitory.A gymnasium, campus
hotel and shopping center are also included. A proposed underground, if not an overpass, will also let students pass with ease from the Administration Building towards the Sugbu Cultural Center and other buildings across the street.

“The UPVCC Development Plan (or Campus Renewal Plan) is a lifetime plan. The way to achieve these physical and development plans is through the cooperation of the whole UPV Cebu community with the coordination and support of the government and also of the people that will invest and believe in us,” Dean Enrique Avila stated.

However, before the physical plans will be put up, Dean Avila stressed that the academic programs should first be enhanced: “The various course divisions of UPV Cebu should have good faculty and it should offer unique programs in the region.” Furthermore, he said that the academic programs should be strengthened and developed so that they will go together with the proposed facilities and infrastructures.

As of now, the college plans to set up a foundation so that resource generation for funding
this development project will not solely depend on the government. The foundation will also be the source of the money needed to relocate informal settlers in Barangay Camputhaw.

Student Council chairperson Karlo Mikhail Mongaya, member of the UPV Cebu Development and Renovation Committee, said that there are two phases in the plan: (1) renovation and renewal and (2) construction.

He estimated that by 2018, UPVCC “will coequal other UP units,” which means that it will be known as UP Cebu, and not just as a branch of UPVisayas.

Mongaya confirmed that there would be a student consultation regarding the UPV Cebu Campus Renewal Plan this January. (Katrina Coloso & Al Marie Padayogdog; UPVCC Info Volunteers)