The Council of Rectors regrets the uncertainty generated by the Constitutional Court's ruling on the free tuition provision and calls for the design of a formula that reconciles student needs.

Regarding the recent announcements by the Constitutional Court (TC) in relation to the request filed by opposition members of Parliament concerning the funding provision for free university education through the Budget Bill, the Council of Rectors declares the following:

1. We regret the uncertainty faced by thousands of students, particularly those entering higher education in 2016, who currently lack clear information regarding their actual access and funding options. Likewise, universities will be forced to set their 2016 budgets without any certainty, which poses a serious threat to their future performance and long-term plans.

2. The Council of Rectors, as it has stated on other occasions, reaffirms and values the necessity and urgency of free tuition as a public policy, especially for the most disadvantaged social sectors. We reiterate the need for access to the free tuition system to establish certain basic eligibility conditions related to quality standards and the effective prohibition of profit-making. These conditions seem essential to us to guarantee that public funding will contribute to improving our higher education system and thus prevent such resources from being misappropriated or used for private enrichment.

3. The Council of Rectors, in accordance with its Organic Law, has no authority to draft legislation nor is it empowered to challenge judicial decisions adopted in accordance with current constitutional procedures. Nevertheless, we call upon all political actors to contribute to designing a formula that reconciles the urgent needs of thousands of students with the institutional structure of our political system.

4. As we stated in the public hearing convened for this purpose by the Constitutional Court, the Council of Rectors does not share the grounds for the claim of unconstitutionality filed by a group of parliamentarians and, for the same reason, we reiterate our rejection of all assertions that tend to portray this Council as a corporation that relies on political or economic privileges. This amounts to ignoring the public role played by the institutions that comprise it throughout its history, a role evidenced by the social recognition it has consistently received from the vast majority of Chileans.