The protest against "the successive cuts in funding for higher education" will mark a new Reception Week for the University of Algarve's Caloiro, which will take place from 17 to 25 September.
The UAlg Academic Association placed the main focus of the event on contesting the cuts decreed by the Government to public Higher Education Institutions, to the detriment of the practices, and promises to take measures to prevent abuses, in the reception of new students.
AAUAlg president Filipa Braz da Silva accuses the Government of breaking its commitment "not to reduce the funding of higher education institutions by more than 1,5 percent in the 2015 budget", ensuring that the cut, at the University of Algarve , will reach «6,5 percent, which is totally unacceptable».
«Between 2010 and 2015, the cut in public funding at the University of Algarve is 32 percent, from 44 million euros to 30 million. In a University where the number of students rose, in the first access stage, 15 percent, compared to the previous year, this is impossible to understand», defended the UAlg student representative.
At the same time as it points out batteries to the guardianship, AAUAlg guarantees that it will make an effort to avoid abuse during the institution's practices. "Pamphlets will be distributed to new students explaining what the policy is for and the limits of it, as well as the internal and external organs that freshmen should use if they feel injured and that include the Council of Veterans, the Dean and the Ministry of Education, in addition to the Academic Association itself», revealed the association.
Filipa Braz da Silva: “New students, like everyone else, must have information that allows them to defend their rights, both in practice and in the quality of education”
These leaflets will also include information about the reasons for the contestation that will be made during the Reception to Caloiro 2014, also because it will work for new students to add their voice to the protests.
"We're still finishing up with the usual commissions on what we're going to do, but the freshman parade will certainly have chants of contestation to the courts and the Government and the candle procession will also have a form of contestation, even because the flame knowledge and the light at the end of the tunnel are definitively extinguished with the current financing policy for higher education», says Filipa Braz da Silva.
“The link between the practice and the challenge to cuts makes sense, since it's a time when freshmen are bombarded with information. The fact that we have a simple pamphlet with information on the practices on one side and information on cuts in higher education funding on the other side facilitates communication with students, which is our top priority. New students, like everyone else, must have information that allows them to defend their rights, both in practice and in the quality of education, which must, according to the law, be qualitatively demanding», explained the same responsible, referring to up to the pamphlets that will be distributed.
Buraka Som Sistema headlines
Meanwhile, the 2014 Freshman Reception Week already has a program and motto: «Not even beasts cut education!». The event at the beginning of the school year, justified by the entry of new students at UAlg, will feature several initiatives linked to academic traditions, but it is also a time for celebration.
From the 17th to the 25th of September, in addition to the daytime events, which include a peddy paper, a Mega Bootcamp, promoted by the sports office, the freshman parade, the shoe dance, the freshman mass and the regular court, there will also be concerts , in which Buraka Som Sistema stands out.
The well-known Portuguese band will perform on the 20th of September, a Saturday, at the venue that will be installed next to the Municipal Swimming Pools of Faro.
Before that, there is the Monumental Serenata at the beginning of the school year, in Largo do Carmo, on September 17th. The Freshman Reception area is inaugurated with the performance of Tunas Académicas, on the 18th of September, a Thursday, which starts a musical entertainment program that runs until the 25th (see poster on the side).
«The organization of the evening aspect of the Caloiro Reception Week is very demanding financially for the Association, and physically for the members of its General Direction, but it is not our priority. We do it because it is a tradition and because the Academic Association needs financial resources to pay its debts», justified Filipa Braz da Silva, who has stated, on several occasions, that the AAUAlg «is not a party committee».
Even so, these events have proven to be decisive in facing the difficult financial situation of AAUAlg, which would have, "at the beginning of 2013, more than one million euros in liabilities and more than 300 thousand euros in negative equity". A debt alleviated by the Academic Weeks, Reception to Caloiro and Arraiais, in 2013 and 2014, which allowed «to obtain more than 200 thousand euros of positive result», accounts that will «be public soon».
Comments