ANNOTATION IMPLIED CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATION OF SCHOOLS TO STUDENTS

By JORGE R. COQUIA *

1. Nature of Contractual Relationship Between the School and the Student, p. 818 2. Contracts Between Schools and Students Imbued with Public Interest, p. 819 3. Breach of the Contract, p. 819 4. Concept of Negligence and Its History, p. 820 5. Elements of the Cause of Action, p. 821 6. Negligence as Quasi-Delict in the Philippines, p. 822 7. Basis of Quasi-DelictsCulpa Aquiliana, p. 822 8. Requisites of Quasi-Delict, p. 823 9. Negligence of the School, p. 824 10. Requisites to Justify Claim for Damages, p. 825 11. Contributory Negligence on the Part of the Student, p. 825 12. Contributory Negligence Does Not Necessarily Bar Recovery From Damages, p. 826

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When a student enrolls in an educational institution, an implied contract is formed where each of the parties has reciprocal rights and obligations. The student is expected to comply with the rules and regulations of the school. On the other hand, it is incumbent upon the school, among others, to

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* Jorge R. Coquia is a retired Associate Justice of Court of Appeals, an Editorial Board Consultant of the Supreme Court Reports Annotated, and a Commissioner of the Commission on Human Rights.

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provide the education needed by the student until he completes the course he pursues.

Some of the issues involving the contractual relation were resolved by the Supreme Court in UNIVERSITY OF THE EAST, Petitioner, versus ROMEO A. JADER, Respondent, G.R. NO. 132344, promulgated on FEBRUARY 17, 2000.

The case involved a student, the herein respondent, who enrolled for a Bachelor of Laws degree in the University of the East, a requirement to be eligible to take the bar examinations for his admission to the practice of law by the Supreme Court. At the end of the second semester of his fourth year and after the final examinations of the school, the faculty and school authorities of the University of the East deliberated on who among the students would be granted a bachelors degree in law. The respondents name appeared in a tentative list of candidates to be granted the degree.

During the schools investiture and commencement ceremonies scheduled on 16 April 1988, respondent student was awarded a bachelor of laws diploma where his proud mother and brother assisted in placing the traditional hood in him. Respondent celebrated his graduation with a reception attended by friends and relatives, who forthwith wished him good luck for the bar examination he had to take. He prepared therefore for the bar review courses, taking a leave from his office from April 28, 1988 to September 30, 1988.

To his consternation and dismay, he was not able to take the bar examinations due to a deficiency in a grade in one of the subjects in the last semester of his course. Respondent filed a case against the school for actual and moral damages he allegedly suffered. The trial court tried and rendered a decision awarding actual and moral damages which the Court of Appeals affirmed.

In a petition for review, the Supreme Court affirmed said decision but eliminated the award of P50,000.00 as moral damages.

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Implied Contractual Obligation of Schools to Students 1. Nature of Contractual Relationship Between the School and the Student

Since the contract created reciprocal rights and obligations, the obligation of a school to educate a student would imply a corresponding obligation on the part of the students for enrollment in the second semester of their course. But even if it can be supposed that the enrollment of a student creates an implied binding contract with the school to educate him for the entire course, since a contract

creates reciprocal rights and obligations, the obligation of the school to educate a student would imply a corresponding obligation on the part of the student to study and obey the rules and regulations of the school. When students breach the supposed contract by refusing to attend their classes, preferring to take to the streets to mount a noisy demonstration against their school, the latter may cancel the contract and close its doors. Its action would be neither arbitrary nor unfair. (Capitol Medical Center, Inc. vs. Court of Appeals, 178 SCRA 493 [1989])

Once a student is accepted for enrollment in a given course, the school may not expel him or refuse to re-enroll him until he completes his course except when he is academically deficient or has violated the rules of discipline. The meaning of this provision is that the school, after having accepted a student for enrollment in a given course may not expel him or refuse to re-enroll him until he completes his course, except when he is academically deficient or has violated the rules of discipline. He is presumed to be qualified to study there for the entire period it will take to complete his course. (Capitol Medical Center, Inc. vs. Court of Appeals, 178 SCRA 493 [1989])

However, there is no contract between the student and the school for the latter to remain open for the entire duration of his course. (Capitol Medical Center, Inc. vs. Court of Appeals, 178 SCRA 493 [1989])

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Implied Contractual Obligation of Schools to Students 2. Contracts Between Schools and Students Imbued with Public Interest

Contracts between school and students are not ordinary, it is impressed with public interest. (Non v. Dames II, 185 SCRA 523 [1990]) The Court in Alcuaz (161 SCRA 7 [1988]), anchored its decision on the termination of contract theory. But it must be repeatedly emphasized that the contract between the school and the student is not an ordinary contract. It is imbued with public interest, considering the high priority given by the Constitution to education and the grant to the State of supervisory and regulatory powers over all educational institutions. (Non v. Dames II, 185 SCRA 523 [1985])

In University of San Carlos v. Court of Appeals, the court held that it is within the sound discretion of the university whether a student may be conferred graduation honors, considering that the student had incurred a failing grade in an earlier course she took in school. 3. Breach of the Contract

When a student commits a serious breach of discipline or fails to maintain the required academic standard, he forfeits his contractual right; and the court should not review the discretion of university authorities. (Licup vs. University of San Carlos, 178 SCRA 637 [1989])

When a student commits a serious breach of discipline or fails to maintain the required academic standard, he forfeits his contractual right; and the court should not review the discretion of university authorities. (Magtibay vs. Garcia, 120 SCRA 370 [1991])

If in Alcuaz, the Court recognized the right of the school to refuse admission to students guilty of breaches of discipline, and of the peace, its right to close when the entire faculty and student population have boycotted their classes, may not be denied. The irony for the school in this case is that it was forced close by student action, and is now being forced to close by student action, and is now being forced to reopen by stu-

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dent action also, assisted by the lower court. We cannot sanction the order of the lower court which gave aid and comfort to the students who paralyzed the operation of the school by their mass actions forcing it to shut down altogether. We cannot approve a situation which would place a school at the mercy of its students. (Capitol Medical Center, Inc. vs. Court of Appeals, 178 SCRA 493 [1989]) 4. Concept of Negligence and Its History

Academic freedom of the school was not an issue in the case under annotation. The more pivotal issue was negligence on the part of the school in dealing with its students.

Negligence was scarcely recognized as a separate tort before the earlier part of the nineteenth century. Prior to that time, the word had been used in a very general sense to describe the breach of any legal obligation, or to designate a mental element, usually one of inadvertence or inattention or indifference, entering into the commission of other torts. As a result, some writers once maintained that negligence was merely one way of committing any tort, just as some courts, for example, spoke occasionally of negligent battery.

One of the earliest appearances of what we now know as the tort of negligence was in the liability of those who professed to be competent in certain public callings. A carrier, an innkeeper, a blacksmith, or a surgeon, was regarded as holding himself out to the public as one in whom confidence might be reposed, and hence as assuming an obligation to give proper service, for the breach of which, by any negligent conduct, he might be liable. But in other fields such as trespass and nuisance the idea developed, thinly disguised, that there might be liability for negligence; and in later years the action on the case produced a large, undigested

group of situations in which negligence was the essence of the tort. (Prosser, Wade and Schwartz, Torts, Cases and Materials, University Casebook Series, The Foundation Press, N.Y ., p. 145)

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Somewhere around the year 1825, negligence began to emerge out of the action on the case, and to be recognized as a separate basis of tort liability, independent of other causes of action. Its rise coincided to a marked degree with the industrial revolution in England. It was probably stimulated a good deal by the enormous increase of industrial machinery in general and by the invention of railways in particular. At that time railway trains were notable on either for speed nor for safety. They killed any object from a Minister of State to a wandering cow, and this naturally reacted upon the law. (Winfield, Law of Tort [5th ed. 1950] 404)

The separate recognition of negligence was undoubtedly greatly encouraged by the disintegration of the old forms of action, and the disappearance of the distinction between direct and indirect injuries, found in trespass and case. Intentional injuries, whether direct or indirect, began to be grouped as a distinct field of liability, and negligence took separate form as the basis of unintended torts. Today, it is no longer disputed that distinct problems and principles, as well as distinct questions of policy, arise in negligence cases. (Prosser, Wade and Schwartz, op. cit, p. 146) 5. Elements of the Cause of Action

Negligence is used to describe the conduct of the defendant. But a cause of action for negligence requires more than such conduct. There must be a duty, and there must be consequences. The traditional formula for the elements necessary to such cause of action includes the following:

1. A duty, which is an obligation recognized by the law, requiring the actor to conform to certain standard of conduct, for the protection of others against unreasonable risks. 2. A failure to conform to the standard required. This is commonly called breach of duty. These two elements go to make up what the courts usually have called negligence; but the term frequently is applied to the second alone. Thus it may be said that the defendant was negligent, but is not liable because he was under no duty to the plaintiff not to be.

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3. A reasonable close causal connection between the conduct and the resulting injury. This is commonly called proximate cause, or sometimes legal cause. It involves a combination of two elementscausation in fact, and legal limitation, which receive separate treatment. (Prosser, Wade and Schwartz, op. cit., p. 146)

6. Negligence as Quasi-Deliet in the Philippines

The Code Commission that codified the present Civil Code agreed to use the term quasi-delict for those obligations which do not arise from law, contracts, quasicontracts, or criminal offenses. They are known in Spanish legal treaties as culpa aquiliana, culpa-extra-contractual or cuasi-delitos. The phrase culpa contractual or its translation extracontractual fault was eliminated because it did not exclude quasi contractual or penal obligations. Aquilinana fault might have been selected, but it was thought inadvisable to refer to so ancient a law as the lex Aquilian. So quasi-delicts was chosen, which more nearly corresponds to the Roman Law classification of obligations and is in harmony with the nature of this kind of liability.

The Commission also, thought of the possibility of adopting the word tort from Anglo-American law. But tort under that system is much broader than the Spanish-Philippine concept of obligations arising from non-contractual negligence. Tort in Anglo-American jurisdiction includes not only negligence, but also intentional criminal acts, such as assault and battery, false imprisonment and deceit. In the general plan of the Philippine legal system, intentional and malicious acts are governed by the Penal Code, although certain exceptions are made in the Project. (Report of the Code Commission, p. 161, cited, Vol. VII, Padilla, Civil Code, Annotated, p. 345) 7. Basis of Quasi-DelictsCulpa Aquiliana

Quasi-delicts are founded on an undoubted principle of justice recognized by all legislations, that every injury, loss or

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damage which a person receives in his right, be it by act or by omission, creates a juridical relation from which is derived the right which the aggrieved party has to be indemnified and the consequent obligation of the other party.

The causes which determine the obligations are two different causesfault (Culpa) and negligence (negligencia), that is, they can be contracted by action or by omission, for fault requires the execution of a positive act which causes a damage to another person distinct from him who cause it and negligence supposes an omission which produces the same effect. Both have in common the act be executed or the omission be incurred without evil intent, for if this element is absent, and if the act or omission should obey an evil intent, then they would be converted to real delicts or misdemeanors (light felony), which would produce penal liabilities and the corresponding civil responsibilities. When the fault or negligence does not reach such serious effects, they however, produce civil obligation limited to repairing the loss caused by means of its indemnity. (12 Manresa, 4th Ed., p. 539 cited in Padilla, Civil Code Annotated, Vol. VII, p. 346.) 8. Requisites of Quasi-Delict

In Daywalt vs. Corporacion de PP. Agustinos Recoletos, 39 Phil. 587, the Supreme Court in applying Article 1902 of the Spanish Civil Code (now Article 2176 of the Civil Code), said that Article 1902 of the Civil Code declares any person who by an act or omission, characterized by fault or negligence, causes damage to another shall be liable for the damage so done. Ignoring so much of this article as relates to liability for negligence, we take the rule to be that a person is liable for damage done to another by any culpable act; and by culpable act we mean any act which is blameworthy when judged by accepted legal standards. The idea thus expressed is undoubtedly broad enough to include any rational conception of liability for the tortuous acts likely to be developed on any society.

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Implied Contractual Obligation of Schools to Students 9. Negligence of the School

While allowing him to participate in the commencement exercises awarding him a diploma of a Bachelor of Laws degree, the respondent school should have notified him of his deficiency in his grade in one subject in order to be able to qualify for the bar examination. It is the law school that certifies that a candidate has finished all the requisites of a Bachelor of Laws degree. Had there been a timely notice to the student, he could have remedied the deficiency during summer as anyway, the bar examinations was to take place in September of every year.

Article 20 of the Civil Code reads:

Every person who, contrary to law, willfully or negligently causes damage to another, shall indemnify the latter for the same.

The aforesaid provision punishes unlawful acts, whether done willfully or negligently. The cause of action for damages may be the willful act of another or negligence.

Article 2176 of the Civil Code reads:

Whoever by act or omission causes damage to another, there being fault or negligence, is obliged to pay for the damage done. Such fault or negligence, if there is no pre-existing contractual relation between the parties, is called a quasi-delict and is governed by the provisions of this Chapter.

Negligence has been defined as the failure to observe for the protection of the interests of another person that degree of care, precaution and vigilance which the circumstances greatly demand, whereby such other person suffers injury.

Negligence, as it is commonly understood, is conduct which creates an undue risk of harm to others. It is the failure to observe that degree of care, precaution, and vigilance which the circumstances justly demand, whereby such other person suffers injury. (Valenzuela vs. Court of Appeals, 253 SCRA 303 [1996])

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Implied Contractual Obligation of Schools to Students 10. Requisites to Justify Claim for Damages

To sustain a claim for damages pursuant to Article 2176 of the Civil Code, the following requisites must concur: (1) That there exists a damage or injury, which must be proved by the person claiming recovery; (2) That there exists a wrongful act or omission imputable to the defendant by reason of his fault or negligence; (3) That there be a direct relation of cause and effect between the damage or injury and the fault or negligence; and (4) That there must be no preexisting contractual relation between the parties. (The Philippine American General Insurance Company, Inc. vs. Terso Formoso, et al., 10 CA. Rep. 716)

The test for determining whether a person is negligent in doing an act whereby injury or damage results to the person or property of another is that: Would a prudent man, in the position of the person to whom negligence is attributed, foresee harm to the person injured as a reasonable consequence of the course about to be pursued. If so, the law imposes a duty on the actor to refrain from that course or to take precaution against its mischievous results, and the failure to do so constitutes negligence. Reasonable foresight of harm, followed by the ignoring of

the admonition born of this provision, is the constitutive fact in negligence. (Picart vs. Smith, 37 Phil. 809) 11. Contributory Negligence on the Part of the Stu dent

The Supreme Court decision in disallowing moral damages granted by the Court of Appeals held that the student himself was also at fault in verifying as to whether he had completed all the academic requisites for his graduation.

The facts as found by the trial court and adopted by the Court of Appeals, which should be considered as conclusive, are that the student (Romeo A. Jader) applied for an application for the removal of the incomplete grade given him by Professor Carlos Ortega which was approved by Dean Celedonio Tiongson after payment of the required fee. He took the

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examination on March 28, 1988. On May 30, 1988, Professor Carlos Ortega submitted his grade. It was a grade of five (5).

Said student should have been diligent enough to verify from Professor Carlos Ortega or at least the Office of the Dean of the College of Law whether he received a satisfactory grade. By merely applying for the removal of an incomplete grade and payment of the required fee did not necessarily mean that he had already remedied the deficiency in his grade in the subject. The said student was already forewarned

and should have taken the proper steps should his application for removal of his incomplete grade be adverse.

Article 2179 of the Civil Code reads:

When the plaintiffs own negligence was the immediate and proximate cause of his injury, he cannot recover damages. But if his negligence was only contributory, the immediate and proximate cause of the injury being the defendants lack of due care, the plaintiff may recover damages, but the courts shall mitigate the damages to be awarded.

The said provision states the rule of contributory negligence. In the case under annotation, the students negligence is only contributory, the immediate and proximate cause being attributable to the defendant, the effect of plaintiffs negligence is only to mitigate the damages. 12. Contributory Negligence Does Not Necessarily Bar Recovery From Damages

The doctrines announced in the much debated case of Rakes vs. Atlantic, Gulf and Pacific Co. (1907), 7 Phil. 359 still rule. Article 1902 of the Civil Code must again be enforced. The contributory negligence of the child and her mother, if any, does not operate as a bar to recovery, but in its strictest sense could only result in reduction of the damages. (Bernal and Enverso vs. House and Tacloban E. and Ice Plant, 54 Phil. 327)

o0o [Implied Contractual Obligation of Schools to Students, 325 SCRA 816()]