On March 24, 1962, following the ban on traditional Student Day celebrations by Salazar’s dictatorial government, Students resisted, defying the ban, and demonstrated in their hundreds in the University City of Lisbon. The dictatorship responded through the merciless intervention of riot police and PIDE, beating, arresting and expelling university students, in an event that changed the course of the regime.
In 1987, Parliament officially recognized March 24th as National Student Day. After 62 anniversaries of that historic morning, perhaps on Sunday, the anniversary is celebrated on March 21, Thursday (traditionally the weekly day dedicated to students), when hundreds more will parade between Rossio and the Assembly of the Republic.
After so many years and political cycles, we do not forget that in the 21st century, 50 years after the fall of the dictatorship and a regime that rejected true equality between citizens, there are still many students who are the first generation in their family to attend education. Higher. And they are, too often, because those who preceded them did not have the socioeconomic conditions that we want to ensure for their descendants, so that the University can be maintained and strengthened as a social elevator par excellence, based on the merit and academic abilities of each person and not in one’s own or family’s social or economic condition.
And that is why LIVRE positions itself at the forefront of defending the rights of Higher Education students. We know how many were able, thanks to public Higher Education and State support to continue their studies, to leave disadvantaged conditions and then raise their families; We remember how many brilliant minds were able to excel in their respective areas because the public University welcomed them under conditions of equality with colleagues from more golden backgrounds.
Throughout the last parliamentary term, LIVRE was present in the defense of public Higher Education where social justice and equity reign, with proposals such as Psychological Support Responses for Victims of Sexual Harassment and Violence in Higher Education Or the Abolition of Admission Fees for Academic Tests. And when thinking about our Electoral Program for the 2024 Legislatures, we redoubled our efforts, aware that the malfunction of the social elevator is a problem that needs to be resolved if we want to have a fairer and more harmonious society.
Among our proposals are the abolition of tuition fees not only in the Bachelor’s degree but also in the Master’s curricular year, bearing in mind that this has become the truly differentiating university degree as the number of graduates increases. We want better regulation of academic fees, with their tabulation and the elimination of those linked to access to assessment tests, which are a right. We intend to expand the access criteria and the values of scholarships, namely through indicators of course cost and local cost of living, as studying in Lisbon, Coimbra or Guarda, History, Architecture or Medicine, has different costs. We defend the immediate reinforcement of funding for Higher Education institutions, particularly those that focus on social action, canteens, medical centers and psychological support. Among several other measures.
Because we are aware of what the difference between free, democratic and accessible Higher Education and a University they cannot access means for thousands of people, LIVRE is uncompromisingly mobilized in defense of student rights, today and always. That’s why we have a robust program dedicated to Science and Higher Education, and specifically to improving the conditions of those who here have the only tangible hope of achieving a more dignified, more fulfilled, happier life.
The Constitution establishes that young people must enjoy special protection in order to realize their rights, namely access to education and professional training, which must be guaranteed equality between citizens in order to access but also to be successful, with the goal of the Portuguese Republic being all learning degrees are free, and that access to Higher Education must guarantee equal opportunities and the democratization of education (articles 70, 74 and 76). There are those who argue that these are mere programmatic norms, thus devaluing their manifest and serious non-compliance and the harmful effect that such disrespect for the fundamental text of the Republic causes on those who, each academic year, are victims of the gap between what the State proclaims and practices.
For LIVRE, these constitutional dictates are firm like all the others, fitting into the project of hope and progress for our society, based on the Democratic Rule of Law and Social Justice, which April bequeathed to us. Correcting this default is one of the objectives to which we are committed, today and always.
The texts in this section reflect the personal opinion of the authors. They do not represent the VISION nor reflect its editorial positioning.
