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Private schools asked parents to pay in advance
KARACHI, Jan 12(Dawn): Irrespective of the fact that the new academic session
will commence on August 16 and summer vacations are six months away, private
schools have started demanding fees of June, July and August in advance, which
is perturbing for parents who are in a quandary.
Some of the parents
interviewed by this reporter in Federal B Area, Gulistan-i-Jauhar,
Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Nazimabad and North Nazimabad said advance fees collection
system was illogical and in violation of government orders issued during the
last two years.
The parents said payment of fees in advance not only
overburdened them financially but also restricted them from shifting their wards
to any other school while having paid the fees for June, July and August in
advance. As per the decisions of the Sindh education department, they said, the
results of final examinations of classes I to VIII would be released by May 31
and as such they would be in a position to decide about shifting their children
only in June and afterwards.
The Sindh education department has been
requested by the parents that it should intervene and make the schools to have a
rational approach on the issue advance fees. Any delay or flexibility by the
education department may put students to face the music as threatened by many of
the private schools.
Parents of students taking education at a couple of
schools in Federal B Area and Nazimabad said they had already received circular
from schools to pay the fee of June, July and August in advance along with the
fees of January, February and March respectively.
Be it the collection of
tuition fees in advance, observance of any other directives of the education
department or private school directorate, parents have been failing to get any
justice, parents complained, adding that when almost every school do maintain
their accounts office in vacation day or have the system of collecting the fees
through banks what were the expediencies for not relieving the
parents.
Last year, after much hue and cry in the media and in view of
parents' grievances, a committee of the education department had asked the
private schools not to receive school fees from Class X students beyond June,
while in the case of other students fee of June should be collected along with
fee of May and that of July along with August fee only after summer
vacations.
When the attention of Sindh Education Secretary Subhago Khan
Jatoi was drawn towards the unrest among parents, he said he personally felt
that the years old practices by private schools were incorrect and he would
personally look into the advance fee collection matter on priority.
The
chairman of All Private Schools Management Association, Sindh chapter, Syed
Khalid Shah, has said the director of private schools very lately had once again
asked the private schools to follow a notification related to advance fee
collection schedule, which was issued about 10 months back by the education
department.
Mr Shah said for the last many years, private schools had
been collecting tuition fees falling in summer vacation in instalments for the
convenience of parents and students, while the latest circular was tantamount to
causing harassment to schools.
He alleged that the education department
had always tried to take those private schools to task that had been cooperating
with it while it ignored so-called big schools operating as commercial ventures.
He said the department should also take notice of those establishments which
collected exorbitant fees and that too for a whole year or six months in
advance.
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| Education News | | Updated: 09 Feb, 2012 |
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