A GROUP of youth and student organizations called for more economic support for learners and teachers as it stressed that immediate government intervention is needed to address the education crisis.

The Take Up Space Movement also asked the government to give vaccination priority to the education sector for the safe resumption of face-to-face classes.

TUSM convener Jake Muñoz claimed that education has been neither free, accessible, nor quality for years, as shown in the alarming number of dropouts, school closures, and education-related deaths in the past year.

“Education is a right, but for the past year, it has felt more like a burden,” Muñoz said in a statement. “Duterte will leave behind an education system that is prohibitively expensive, inaccessible to the masses, and thus, a privilege for the wealthy.”

Ahead of President Rodrigo Duterte’s last State of the Nation Address, the TUSM came out five demands or #5Calls following consultations with youth groups, teachers, and parents nationwide.

These include vaccination prioritization of the education sector, more support for students, teachers, and parents through subsidies for gadgets and internet, reducing tuition, recognition of Internet access as a human right, and “de-oligarchization” of the telecommunications and electricity industries.

The group called for systematic mass testing and contact tracing, and the retrofitting of schools.

The TUSM member organizations include the Samahan ng Progresibong Kabataan, PLM BUKLURAN Student Alliance, and Katipunan Student Movement-Kasama BULSU.