Universities Our Concern

The twentieth century has seen the rise of democratic interest of the people in various corners of the sphere, struggling for a lungful of democratic air, if not tasting the well growing fruits of democracy. No longer we consider dictatorships or gang rules to be civilized. It is heartening that idea of democracy is finally taking roots in the world. But we have to be careful that democracy does not degenerate into centralization, minoritysm or dictatorships of one constitution-fits-all. History has taught us lessons that ideology evolves, mostly undesiredly if not well eyed and well controlled.

The idea of democracy should also be showered into various institutions and machinery internally of a nation. The university is one of the important institutions that is urgently in need of a breathful of fresh air. The conservative thinking taking place in the mind of the leadership of the universities all this while has denied the freedom of the undergraduates, thus failed to utilize the potentials in them for the interest of the nation's development.

The institutional structure of a university should ideally consist of three parts, namely the academicians, the students and the administrators. These three groups form a horizontal triangle, which represents the equality in power and status of them. Only through the co-ordination and co-operation of the three, the university is bound to serve effectively as the center of intellectual in the country. The situation we are on currently, however, displays a rather significant offset in the practice of the administrations of the universities. The administrators of the universities have the mentality of being empowered to rule the university instead of to merely administrate it. Therefore, it is not unusual to encounter issues that reflect the horizontal hierarchy, where the administrators as the ruling group and the other two as the ruled ones. In conjunction with this, it is no more extraordinary for students to be illtreated by officers. It is also common for policies, rules and decisions that are not transparent to be imposed and executed. It is also therefore, an understatement that there is no two way communication and the power is centralized in the hands of a small group of selected people.

The development of the country that has been dramatically and unhealthily fast has also result in the increase of intake of fresh-undergraduates year by year. This is to meet for the demands of the developments. The increase in intake will only produce good result if and only if the increase of facilities and teaching aids are proportionately improved. The obvious situations we can observe is that the improvement of these facilities are pretty much discouraging. As some examples, the parking lots initially meant for 100 are now forced to cater for 150. The lecture halls, similarly, has to bear a sqeezeful of uncomfortable students that will result in inefficiency of the knowledge transferring process. The administrations of the universities are unlikely to be handling this problem well. Hostels are only built after the abundance of the students. Pedestrian paths are eventually used as the parking lots for motorcycles. These so called solutions has indeed showed the serious lack of capability of the administration level.

The safety of the campus has become an issue lately when there were rape cases reported on the daily newspapers. With a group of professionally hired security officers on duty, it is hard for one to imagine how outlaws could have the slightest chance to find their targets, particularly female students. The safety of the campus is of main concern. The students can hardly concentrate on their studies if the threat of being raped and hurt exists in their minds. The security system of the campus, in this matter, is of the utmost importance. There is to be any failure in either the construction of the system or the carrying out of duties, the security personnel should be held responsible.

The university is suppose to be an institution where idealism nourish, and where the individual potentials are given a space to be fully discovered and utilized. The society is in need of these intellects to bring developments and improvements to the nations. In other words, the country relies on this particular institution as a human resource center. Thus, the government, of the people by the people and for the people, has to ensure this institution to be equipped with everything at its best. The problems stated above ought to be solved urgently or the vision of our country is very likely to be slowed down, if not impeded.

BY FRENZIE