One of the schools accused by the Education Minister of breaching the government's tuition fee policy has responded stating that it's facing an uphill task in making ends meet.
Mona High School says the subvention from the Ministry of Education is not enough to offset its operational expenses.
Last September, the government removed auxillary fees and allowed schools to ask parents for voluntary contributions.
However, Principal of Mona High, Kevin Jones, says since the implementation of the policy, contributions have fallen significantly.
“Our compliance rate was 86 per cent and then last year - 2016/2017, it went down to 33 percent……”
Yesterday, Education Minister Senator Ruel Reid listed Mona High and four other schools as reportedly forcing parents and guardians to pay mandatory fees.
The others are St Andrew High, Holy Childhood High, The Queens School and St Thomas Technical High.
Meanwhile, Jones also provided details of the alleged breach of the government's tuition fee policy.
He said a parent only had $3,000 to pay for the registration package which costs $5,000. Jones said he told the parent to return with the remainder but the parent did not return.
Jones said it was a one off incident and he is disappointed that it has painted him and the school in a negative light.
“What we do realise is that once you break up these items, what you find most of the time is that the parents do not pay for it. So the basic things that the student needs to have come September morning , you put them in a package and say to the parents, here is the bundle, you pay for it and we will take care of it,” he said.
St. Thomas Technical High
Meanwhile, the administration of the St. Thomas Technical High is seeking to justify the near 100-percent increase in the School Development Fund.
It has moved from $3,500 dollars to $6,500 .
The school's administrators met yesterday after parents expressed alarm at the increase. Acting Vice-Principal of St. Thomas Technical, Richardo Morgan, says the fee is voluntary and used to help fund extra curricula activities.
He added that students have not been turned away or denied access due to the non-payment of fees.
Corruption and extortion
And the Education Minister is maintaining that the practice of schools forcing parents to pay voluntary contributions should be considered as corruption and extortion.
“I am reiterating that this is a deliberate act on the part of the schools to try to bypass the policy of the government that says contributions are not mandatory and I have had to use strong language to get the message across. We have been here before …. These are educational institutions. They are very literate - they know what we mean by voluntary contributions….” the Education Minister said.
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