A little over a dozen made it through the metal gates, past the catwalk, and into the executive office balcony of Quezon Hall. Moments later, the words, “Shame, BOR!” were splattered in white paint across the heavy door. Below them, the rest of the crowd continued to chant: “BOR, baba!”

This was how UP Law Dean Edgardo Carlo Vistan II met the UP community when he was selected as UP Diliman’s (UPD) 12th chancellor on April 3. Only four months prior, lawyer Angelo Jimenez also faced protests when he was installed as the 22nd university president.

In both scenarios, former UPD Chancellor and nominee Fidel Nemenzo received sectoral backing from members of the community. Despite this, the 11-member UP Board of Regents (BOR) did not select him.

The BOR has the ability to dictate over the university as UP’s highest governing body, freeing itself from accountability even if it acts against UP’s interests. Meanwhile, academic collegial bodies representing actual stakeholders, such as the University Council (UC) and student councils, continue to be sidelined.

By its very structure, the BOR enables the state to meddle in university affairs. This, in turn, creates an imbalance between the academic community and the state, as the latter puts premium over personal affiliations and politics over reason and meritocracy.

External influences in the boardroom are rooted in the regents’ affiliations, including fraternities and sororities. The interests of the studentry, faculty, and staff, therefore, become a second thought inside the board despite being the biggest stakeholders.

These relationships prove to be problematic for UP, as shown with BOR’s aggressiveness in holding executive sessions and secret ballots during important discussions such as the selection of top university officials. Here, the regents are free to vote for whoever they like without any regard for the sectors’ demands.

In 2014, the College of Business Administration was renamed to Cesar Virata School of Business in exchange for a P40-million donation. In this particular instance, the board’s true intentions are exposed with politicized regents in power. While the membership of BOR changed, its detached persona continued allowing implementations of policies that are criticized for being anti-poor, such as lifting academic ease policies beginning academic year 2022-2023.

The board’s opaque processes, along with its vast blanket prerogatives, ultimately create an institution that disregards UP’s mandate of democratic governance with short-sighted regents basking in power.

Power-grabbing, influenced by partisan politics, hinders universities’ ability to excel, a 2019 assessment in Indonesia by international politics expert Andrew Rosser revealed. The recent years, especially in 2021, have seen the same truth in UP that slipped lower in the global ranking, as issues in research, employment, and academic policies remain unsolved while power contests continue at Quezon Hall.

These behind-the-scenes politics make up the reason why sectors’ demands continue to fall on deaf ears. The resolve, then, is to install the collegial UC to replace the BOR as the highest authority which gives UP a chance to elevate from its current situation. This governance structure is not novel, as it has already been implemented successfully at the University of Hong Kong (UHK) after replicating frameworks of top universities Oxford and Cambridge for a more consultative approach.

Actions and statements from the UC have proven their ranks to be capable of managing the university that they are part of. As a collegial body with first-hand knowledge of issues, the UC could mirror both UHK’s Council and Senate. In this new framework, the Council will govern the university and its students, and manage resources.

Allowing UC to take the helm will topple the status quo of BOR being the supreme authority. As faculty members themselves, the UC have knowledge on the lived experiences of their colleagues and students, whose welfare appears to be the least of the BOR’s concerns.

The main objective is to duplicate the success it brought abroad and address the essence of the problem with BOR: governance that bows to reactionary forces and is remote from the university. This will, hopefully, bridge the relations between Quezon Hall and UP. However, these changes can only be implemented by legislating amendments to the 15-year-old UP Charter.

With Marcos in power, recalibrating the very foundation of freedom exercised in UP is risky. The university, at its current state, can no longer function with covert intervention of external forces into the policies that are detached with the lived experiences of the students and sectors.

Opening the Congress’s floor for deliberations on the UP Charter will position the university as an institution fostering its long-standing tradition of academic excellence and freedom. Instead of having the students and the BOR going head-to-head at every major meeting, the community can instead lobby its assertions at the Congress. This can finally end the culture of under-the-table engagements at the BOR.

The failures of the BOR in recent years create a drastic need to reform the charter. As a cumulative front, the community must forward to the Congress a rebooted university governance, shifting powers from BOR to the UC and other collegial, democratic bodies that have proven themselves capable of asserting their sectors’ best interests with their knowledge of ground-level issues. Once and for all, UP can meet its demands at the formulation stage.

Trends across the globe now see universities as corporations rather than the state’s mandate of serving its people, a 2017 analysis showed. As the national university, UP has the responsibility of setting the standard for all other higher education institutions in the country. It must set an example of what academic freedom and education can do for the country and the people.

Breaking away from the current university administration structure will give an avenue for the community to contribute to the decision-making process. In turn, a university led by members of the sectors with knowledge on ground-level issues will enliven the spirit of UP as an institution for the people. ●

Read the entire series here.