Students' Party for Equality and Advancement of Knowledge (SPEAK) was a non-profit student political party in the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP).[1] PUP SPEAK was one of the organizations that pushed for the university's "national polytechnic university" status, with an allocation of additional ₱3 billion budget annually.[2] It also launched the "academic ease" campaign, where it pushed for the implementation of measures that aimed to help students and educators to quickly adapt to distance learning, brought by the COVID-19 pandemic.[3] The campaign was supported by Education SecretaryLeonor Briones. SPEAK also supports a smoke-free environment for the new normal.[4]
History and campaigns
SPEAK was formed after its predecessor, PUP Alliance Resisting Repression of Students (ARREST), successfully mounted a campaign to remove a college dean accused of corruption. Since then, the organization has focused on the issues of students' rights, women and LGBT rights, labor rights, environmental protection, anti-Marcos burial to heroes' cemetery, anti-religious discrimination, and anti-dictatorship, among many others.[5] The organization had been the ruling political party of the PUP Central Student Council from 2016 to 2021.[6] In 2017, the organization has been tagged as "[university] administration-leaning", after its founding chairman and then-incumbent PUP Central Student Council President Elijah San Fernando organized the election of the student representative to the university's board of regents.[7][8]
