The House Committee on Higher and Technical Education chaired by TINGOG Partylist Representative Jude Acidre consolidated and approved House Bills (HBs) 4799 and 5042, which seek to amend Republic Act 8292, or the “Higher Education Modernization Act of 1997,” in order to strengthen the governance of State Universities and Colleges (SUCs), clarify the role of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED), and introduce differentiated autonomy tied to institutional performance.
In filing the measure, Acidre and HB 4799 co-author Tingog Party-list Representative Andrew Julian Romualdez highlighted the need for reforms and noted that three decades after the enactment of the original law, challenges such as bureaucratic hurdles, insufficient financing, and a lack of clear governance structures still hinder the full realization of the law’s intent.
“We can empower our SUCs to become true centers of academic excellence, innovation and public service.”
If the proposed amendment is enacted into law, “we can empower our SUCs to become true centers of academic excellence, innovation and public service,” the co-authors said.
Lanao del Sur Representative Zia Alonto Adiong, for his part, said he filed HB 5042 pursuant to his vision of future-ready SUCs “empowered to continuously update programs, strengthen linkages with industry, and uphold academic freedom while being accountable to the Filipino people.”
During deliberations, Dr. Karol Mark Yee, Executive Director of the 2nd Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM II), raised the issue of coordination gaps among education agencies.
“62% of our high school teachers are handling subjects they did not study for.”
“We’ve seen in the findings of EDCOMM II that 62% of our high school teachers are handling subjects they did not study for. There has been poor alignment between DepEd and CHED, and we are seeing that many of our SUCs are offering teacher education programs that are not really consistent with the needs of DepEd at public schools,” explained Yee.
He also backed the proposal on differentiated autonomy, noting that CHED supervises 113 SUCs with only five commissioners.
According to Yee, “the proposal is to provide differentiated autonomy that will ultimately incentivize SUCs to attain higher levels of quality, and if they do that, they gain greater levels of autonomy when it comes to academic management, fiscal management, as well as administrative affairs.”
He proposed the inclusion of the Director General of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) in the governing boards of polytechnic and technological universities as a forward-looking reform to address long-standing coordination gaps and strengthen the development of higher-level qualifications and institutions aligned with high-level skills.
The committee also approved numerous measures creating and converting SUCs and campuses nationwide, establishing new university campuses, modernizing and expanding technical-vocational education and TESDA programs, including the creation of training and assessment centers, and institutionalizing reforms to strengthen higher education and skills development, with some measures approved outright and others approved subject to style and amendments, all including their corresponding committee reports where applicable.
