THE COORDINATING Council of Private Educational Associations (Cocopea) has called on state education bodies to loosen “restrictive regulations” on schools grappling with the energy crisis.
In a statement released March 30, Cocopea urged the government to adopt more flexible and “empathetic” regulatory policies to help ease financial pressures on students, faculty, and staff.
“We, therefore, urge the national government and its education agencies to grant the private education sector broad latitude to adopt urgent and necessary measures that will ease these financial pressures on our stakeholders, especially our students,” the statement read.
The government bodies mentioned in the statement were the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd), the Department of Education (DepEd), and the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda).
Cocopea proposed greater flexibility in adopting varied learning modalities, implementing transparent mechanisms for tuition increases and fee adjustments, the prompt release of government subsidies for students and teachers, and the involvement of CHEd, DepEd, and Tesda in the Unified Package for Livelihoods Industry, Food, and Transport (Uplift) Committee.
The Uplift Committee was created under Executive Order 110 in 2016 to ensure that rising energy prices do not disrupt the availability of fuel, food, agricultural products, public utilities, and other infrastructure amid the crisis in the Middle East.
“We hope that various rules that impose unnecessary, duplicative, or bureaucratic costs on private higher education institutions, schools, and training institutes be reviewed and reformed immediately,” the statement added.
UST recently allowed its academic units to ramp up online classes to up to 50 percent of course hours for the remainder of the term.
The University Crisis Management Committee’s Subcommittee on Natural and Environmental Crises also endorsed campus-wide energy conservation by setting air-conditioning units across the campus to 24 degrees Celsius and with limited operating hours.
As of writing, only the Memorandum Circular 114 has been released by the government, directing its agencies to reduce energy consumption through condensed workweeks. No directives and regulatory policies have been issued for the private education sector as of writing.“
Private education shares the burden of the crisis with various other sectors,” Cocopea, an organization representing at least 1,500 private educational institutions nationwide, said.
