MANILA, Philippines – Kinwestyon ng miyembro ng Kamara ang P8 bilyong hindi nagamit na pondo ng Commission on Higher Education (CHED) mula 2019 hanggang 2022 na ibinalik sa national treasury, sa pagsasabing ginamit na lamang sana ang pondo para sa mga kritikal na programa ng ahensya.
Sa pagdinig ng House Committee on Appropriations para sa panukalang badyet sa taong 2025, sinabi ni CHED executive director Cinderella Filipina Benitez-Jaro na ang kanilang unutilizied funds ay bumaba mula sa P4.1 bilyon noong 2019 sa P2.2 bilyon noong 2020.
Pagsapit ng 2021 ay nasa P974 milyon ito at bumaba pa sa P820 milyon noong 2022.
Iginiit ni Northern Samar 1st District Rep. Paul Daza, na marami na sanang nagawa ang CHED para sa P8 bilyong hindi nagamit na pondo sa loob ng apat na taon.
“From 2019 to 2022, we have P8 billion unused by CHED. If you had better utilization, you could’ve used that to help institutions, you could’ve helped students graduate because our attrition rate is 30-40%. You could’ve added in the living allowance subsidy, Tertiary Education Subsidy,” ayon sa mambabatas.
Bilang tugon, sinabi ni CHED chairman Prospero de Vera III na ang “significant reversion” noong 2019 ay may kaugnayan sa Philippine-California Advanced Research Institutes (PCARI), na isang 5-year research project na pinondohan ng pamahalaan.
“Our PCARI project was winding down and the money could not be used for other purposes anymore because PCARI is a long term project involving high level research of universities and we had problems. The project started before my time and we ended it in 2020 or 2021,” ani De Vera.
“When the PCARI program ended, we did not continue with it anymore because we saw how difficult it was to implement it. And these are projects by the University of the Philippines, by Ateneo, and the others. We had a P6 billion funding for PCARI authorized by Congress and though I must admit we had challenges in using that money.”
Sa kabila nito, sinabi ni De Vera na ang CHED ay ginawa ang makakaya nito para pataasin ang utilization rate ng hanggang 97% noong 2022 sa kabila ng COVID-19 pandemic.
Samantala, kinwestyon ni Daza sa kaparehong pagdinig ang high attrition rate noong 2022, kung saan anim sa 10 estudyante lamang ang nakakagraduate sa kolehiyo.
“That’s very sad and I hope the media will cover that because 41%, meaning out of 10 students enrolling, 6 lang ang nakakatapos. And that’s why we have the Free Tuition Law, which includes living allowance which is what we called TES,” ani Daza.
Ayon kay De Vera, ang cohort attrition rate ay bumaba “significantly” matapos ang pandemic, ngunit tumaas ng hanggang 41% noong 2022.
“The National Higher Education cohort attrition rate from 2021 to 2023, it increased from 37.8% to 41% in 2022. It has gone down to 29.39% in 2023. So there is a significant reduction after COVID in terms of cohort attrition rate,” ayon sa CHED chairman.
“That means 41% of the enrolled students did not continue or stopped. It doesn’t mean they will not go back for that particular year,” dagdag pa niya.
Noong Pebrero, sinimulan ng CHED ang research project para suriin ang equity sa admission at retention policies ng state universities and colleges (SUCs) bilang bahagi ng hakbang nito na gawing inclusive para sa mga mag-aaral na Filipino ang higher education.
Nang panahong iyon, iginiit ni De Vera na ang
attrition rate o bilang ng mga estudyanteng hindi nakakakumpleto ng kanilang pag-aaral ay “very high.” RNT/JGC
