AS I continue my advocacy for education, I would like to share some important legal principles and case law regarding students’ right to choose a field of study and to enroll until graduation. This is also known as students’ academic freedom. This topic is usually discussed in many schools at this time, when semesters and school years are about to end, and the next ones are about to begin.
The right to choose a field of study is anchored on Section 5(3) of Article XIV of the 1987 Constitution, which provides: “Every student has a right to select a profession or course of study, subject to fair, reasonable and equitable admission and academic requirements.” The right of students to enroll until graduation means that students have the right to complete the program, save only for academic delinquency and serious violations of school policy. As long as the student meets the school’s scholastic and academic requirements and has not committed a serious violation of school policy, the student should not be denied enrollment in subsequent academic years or semesters until graduation.
The right of students to enroll until graduation, however, is not absolute, as it is subject to compliance with reasonable school rules and regulations. In University of San Agustin, Inc. v. CA, the school refused to re-admit third-year nursing students who failed to meet its retention policy, invoking its right to academic freedom. In upholding the action of the school, the Supreme Court explained that while it is true that an institution of learning has a contractual obligation to afford its students a fair opportunity to complete the course they seek to pursue, the obligation of the school to educate a student would imply a corresponding obligation on the part of the student to study and obey the rules and regulations of the school. When a student commits a serious disciplinary breach or fails to maintain the required academic standard, he forfeits his contractual rights.
In University of the Philippines Board of Regents v. Ligot Telan, the Supreme Court ruled that a student’s academic dishonesty to secure the tuition subsidy or scholarship is a valid ground for his non-readmission.
In Alcuaz v. PSBA, the court upheld the legality of the school’s action when the students were blacklisted and denied re-admission for the second semester for participating in mass assemblies and barricading school entrances in violation of the school administration’s orders.
In Cudia v. Superintendent of the Philippine Military Academy, the Supreme Court upheld the right and power of educational institutions to impose disciplinary proceedings over their students, including expulsion from the program. Borrowing a Bohemian proverb, the Supreme Court declared, “A school without discipline is like a mill without water. Insofar as the water turns the mill, so does the school’s disciplinary power assure its right to survive and continue operating. In this regard, the Court has always recognized the right of schools to impose disciplinary sanctions, which include the power to dismiss or expel, on students who violate disciplinary rules.”
This power of the school to impose disciplinary measures extends even after graduation for any act done by the student prior thereto. In the University of the Philippines Board of Regents v. CA, the Court upheld the university’s withdrawal of a doctorate degree already conferred on a student who was found to have committed intellectual dishonesty in her dissertation. The Supreme Court explained that where it is shown that an honor or distinction was conferred through fraud, a university has the right to revoke or withdraw the honor or distinction it conferred. This freedom of a university does not terminate upon the “graduation” of a student, for it is precisely the “graduation” of such a student that is in question.
Finally, in Yap Chin Fah v. Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court held that, in addition to academic delinquency and serious violations of school policies, students may be refused admission by a school on account of strained relations with their parents. The Supreme Court ruled that “... where relations between parents and students on the one hand, and teachers and administrators upon the other hand, have deteriorated to the level here exhibited, a private school may, in the interest of the rest of the student body and of the faculty and management as a whole, and of the children of the parents affected, require the affected children to be enrolled elsewhere.”
