(Sam Wasson/Getty Images/AFP)
Doing so, the Supreme Court (SC) ruled, “is capricious and inconsistent with an institution of higher learning’s contractual obligation to afford its students a fair opportunity to complete the course they seek to pursue.”
The SC said: “Academic freedom accords an institution of higher learning the right to decide for itself its aims and objectives and how best to attain them. It is both a right and an obligation.”
“However, when the institution acted with grave abuse of discretion or patent arbitrariness, its actions may be nullified by the courts,” it stressed.
The SC’s ruling, which cited its previous decisions and released last Feb. 26, dismissed the petition filed by St. Louis University, Inc. (SLU) in Baguio City, which challenged the 2011 decision of the Court of Appeals (CA).