Parents protest against high fees, ask for earlier promise to be fulfilled

Schools asking for June, July fees already, say parents.

KARACHI: Parents of students studying in the Karachi Public School protested on Monday because the school refused to bring down the raised tuition fee, despite earlier negotiations. The parents held a demonstration outside the school, situated at Shahrae Faisal, and said that the school management is being insensitive and stubborn. “They’re telling us to enroll our children in government schools, they’re not going to decrease the fee,” a parent complained.

The anxious parents had protested earlier this month on January 4 as well, after which Adviser to Chief Minister on Education Naveed Zubairi and Mansoor Siddiqui had assured them that the fee would be reduced.

The administration of the school had announced a Rs500 per month increase in the fees of their primary school while the secondary school monthly fees would also be raised by Rs800. With the raise, the new bi-monthly fee of a child attending secondary school was an inflated Rs9,000 and that of a primary school-going child reached Rs6,000.

Paying in advance

Meanwhile, private schools across the city are pressing parents to pay the fees for the two summer vacation months, June and July, in the months of January and February.

Parents have complained that there is no regulatory body to properly monitor and control the affairs of private schools, which are now demanding money in the form of fees ‘if and when they please’.

“My employers don’t give me my salary in advance so how can I pay the school fees in advance?” said Rizwan, whose two sons go to a private school.

He said that the government should take notice of the issue and direct private schools to charge fees on a monthly basis.

Some parents who send their children to private schools in Federal B Area and Nazimabad said that they had already received circulars and reminders from schools to pay the fees of June and July within this month.

Habibur Rehman, another parent, said many of the private schools were functioning in rented buildings and had to meet expenses, including utility bills, teachers’ salaries and other expenditure, from the fees they received from students. However, he added, if these schools charge fees for summer vacation months in monthly installments they would still be able to manage.

Parents are also concerned about many other ‘money-minting’ initiatives of private schools, such as mandatory purchase of stationery, books and uniforms and even school bags either from the schools or from their prescribed shops.

The chairman of All Private Schools Management Association, Sindh chapter, Syed Khalid Shah, said that the private schools’ management is compelled to get advance fees of June and July in the months of January and February, because they have no other resources to meet their expenditures.

Shah said that the some parents do not bother depositing fees for June and July, and so in order to ensure that they can collect the fees, they ask for it in first two months of the year.

When contacted, Mansoor Siddiqui, head of the directorate of registration and inspection of private institutions, Karachi, said that his department has already issued a circular to all registered private schools and institutions about collecting fees for the months of June and July. He said that according to the circular, the students of class X can pay the fee for the Academic Session 2010-11 up to March 2011, while students of classes I to IX can pay the fees anytime from January to May 2011, as per convenience of their parents.

He added that if any parent intends to withdraw their children because they want to enroll them in another school, they should submit an application to the institution concerned and the fees for April to July 2011 should be paid by the students’ parents.

Siddiqui said that if the registered private institutions and schools violate this circular, the directorate would take them to account. He said that the parents could complain to the department if the private institutions refuse to provide them relief for submission of fees of summer vacation months.

With additional input from PPI.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 11^th, 2011.