As per the report, parents are of the view that the schools should disclose operating financial costs along with their fee structures
Sixty four per cent parents have said that there should be a cap on annual fee hikes of private schools across the country. Thirty six per cent parents said that they were in favour of capping the absolute school fee amount.
The findings are a part of a recently released series of surveys conducted by Local Circles, a citizen engagement platform with 9,200 citizens from across 200 plus districts of India. The survey was conducted in the backdrop of several parents complaining about excessive fee hikes in the country before the new academic year begins in most schools across the country. "Parents across the country are very concerned as school fees in the last few years has been rising at a much faster rate than the average earnings of the parents, thereby creating a squeeze. In last year's structured discussion, many parents admitted to cutting discretionary and household expenses to be able to afford their child's school education," states the report.
Over 69 per cent schools across the country were found hiking their fees for the upcoming academic year, with 50 -75 per cent parents from the states of Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Delhi stating that fee hike for their respective schools has been more than 10 per cent this year. According to the survey results, 46 per cent parents were of the opinion that the increase in annual fees should be linked to inflation.
Jayant Jain, President, Forum for fairness in education, a Mumbai-based NGO that takes up issues with respect to fee hikes said that the results reflect the reality with respect to fee hikes that are being imposed across private schools in the country. "Private schools are trying to exploit parents by hiking their fees every year by huge margins. Apart from fees, parents also have to pay admission fees, form charges, additional expenses like activity expenses, bus fees etc. While the increase is astronomical, parents' incomes are going up at a much slower rate thus putting a lot of additional burden on their pockets for their child's education," said Jain.
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