One major unresolved issue parents have been complaining since the beginning of this global pandemic is that all the schools are demanding full fee of their students. However, schools seem to have their own monetary issues as they have to meet the overheads like building rental and teachers’ salaries. with due respect when Govt. announced 20% fee waiver then why schools association approached the court and paid heavy legal fee to lawyers why they don’t accept it without hesitation. In my viewpoint, it was a fair decision and in favor of school owners. Technically speaking, it should be 25-30 percent. As there has been a significant reduction in utility bills of all the schools. Here the question arises why not school owners themselves initiated this fee relief offer.
Here the the most important aspect is we being one nation need to be considerate and should realize that this global health crisis has turned out to be a financial as well as emotional crisis. People have been off work for months with depression. People are living under constant stress of being unemployed. Few suicide cases have been reported by the media that people who were in state of depression committed suicide. It is a war like situation.
School owners should understand the gravity of the situation and should come forward and take this bold step of reducing the fee. There is a dire need for constructive dialog between parents and school management in which they should devise a strategy to resolve all the issues considering the mutual benefit.
If we are not going to take this crucial matter seriously, we will have to suffer the far-reaching consequences. I can foresee that when the schools resume many parents will change the schools of their children in order to save money. At present parents are overburdened with the additional expense of setting online classes for their children. They are bound to have high speed internet connection. Besides, they have to have a laptop or a desktop to attend these online classes. What’s worse, depending on the age group parents have to spare time and pay full attention during the class hours. As without parental involvement students of lower classes cannot manage it at all. But sorry to say in many cases, school management is rigid and not flexible to give any discount in fee.
I hope considering the mutual benefit of both parents and school management there must be a way out.
Article by Humayun Khan.
