CALBAYOG CITY, Samar — The Northwest Samar State University (NwSSU) will limit the number of freshmen enrollees this year due to the limited budget in the implementation of the free education law.
NwSSU President Benjamin Pecayo said the PHP48 million budget for the free education this academic year is not enough to accommodate all freshmen applicants, who want to avail of this assistance.
“We are disheartened that we could not accept them all due to limited budget given by the national government for our school,” Pecayo said in a press briefing Thursday.
Before the implementation of free tuition education law, each student pays around PHP5,000 for tuition fee per semester.
The university has nearly 3,000 students in their main campus in this city and in their extension campus in San Jorge town.
“Technically, we can only accommodate around 1,200 new students for this school year,” said Pecayo.
The university received nearly 6,000 freshmen application this year after the government announced the free tuition fee.
“If we will accept all these 6,000 applicants, we will be needing budget way higher than the PHP48 million allocation,” Pecayo said.
The school will select new students based on merit and their performance during the interview, and if they were able to pass the college entrance examination.
“No favor will be accepted by the university from anyone just to accommodate a student to study here. It is unfair for those who performed well and they will not be accepted because we give the slot to another student because somebody asked for them to be admitted,” Santiago stressed.
Most students of the NwSSU come from the towns in the first district of Samar and this city.
The school offers courses under the College of Education, College of Management, College of Engineering and Technology, College of Information Technology and College of Arts and Sciences.
Although the tuition is free, Pecayo clarified that there are still other fees that students have to pay. (Roel Amazona/PNA)
