The Chilean president, Michelle Bachelet, celebrated the Parliament passing the law on free public university, which puts an end to four decades of a controverted superior education model.

“We have taken a major step towards free superior education, a step that three years ago was unconceivable and seemed impossible to be achieved”, said the president.

The law, passed during the last few days of 2015 and enacted before Christmas, was one of Bachellet promises during her electoral campaign, which led her to win her second term of office in March 2014.

During the first phase it will benefit 178.000 low resources students, around 27.5% of the total number of college students in Chile. They will be able to enter public universities without costs, as well as certain private institutes that fulfil some requisites, such as being non-profit.

According to the commitment assumed by the government, this is just an initial step, as by 2020 they expect to achieve universal free of charge superior education. By 2018, when Bachellet ends her term of office, it is expected that 70% of students coming from low income households will be able to study without paying.

Free university was a desire of millions of young Chileans, as well as of teachers and parents. Since 2011, these social groups organized and developed massive student protests to demand free of charge, high quality and non-profit education.

Until now, no university was free, including state universities. On the contrary, they charged annual fees that go up to thousands of dollars, an amount of money that many students and their families cannot pay.

In Chile, around half of the workers earn monthly salaries lower to USD 500, and the annual costs for universities are around USD 3.400.

The issue of quality education is, undoubtedly the big challenge as, despite the high costs, this could not be guaranteed by universities.

To finance free public university, the government has developed a profound tax reform that modified the tax system in Chile. One of the main changes was the gradual increase of taxes to large companies –from 20% to 27%-, which adds USD 8.3000 million to tax collection and ensures that free education is financed.

The new law also established an increase in scholarships for students of technical and professional training institutions. These organizations have not been included in the proposal yet, but they will be gradually added to the free of charge system.

“We will keep on moving forward towards high quality, democratic and free superior education, in a responsible and gradual way that fits the capacities we have in our country”, stated Bachellet.

Once free of charge university is achieved, the focus must be put on quality and the renewal of contents that enables the development of real 21^st century professionals.