Half a million of the Philippines’ poorest high school graduates have been denied the chance to pursue college—not because they lacked the will, but because government abandoned them. The damning report from EDCOM II is not just a statistic; it is a verdict on the failure of the Tertiary Education Subsidy (TES) under the so-called “free tuition law.”

In 2021, over 500,000 senior high school graduates came from 4Ps families, the very sector the subsidy was created to uplift. Yet only 495 students—yes, less than one-tenth of one percent—actually received support. To call this a scandal is an understatement. This is betrayal institutionalized by neglect, a state policy that parades as pro-poor but functions as exclusionary.

Even more outrageous, no new TES slots were opened for three academic years. If these graduates had been given their rightful aid, many would now be finishing their college degrees. Instead, the nation has manufactured a “lost generation”—young Filipinos who were forced to abandon dreams because leaders could not deliver on a law they bragged about.

The solution is clear: automatic TES eligibility for 4Ps graduates. No more delays, no more broken promises. Unless urgent amendments to RA 10931 are enacted and properly enforced, the government will remain complicit in perpetuating poverty. The message today is cruelly simple: if you are poor, higher education is not your right.