HYDERABAD: In a survey carried out by a Parents Association Coordination Committee (PACC), it has been found that nearly 70 per cent of private schools in the city lack basic infrastructures like playground and computer labs or have outdated computers and software but religiously charge fee for these. The survey was conducted for three months. Despite being run by charitable organisations, private schools in the city are extracting huge amount of fees as per their whims and fancies, alleged PACC at a round table meeting on fee hike, exploitation of parents and falling standard of private educational institutions, on Saturday.
“These schools don’t have playgrounds but charge sports fees. Their computers are outdated but the fee structure always has this component. In addition, there is a donation, admission fee, term, smart class fee, bus, calligraphy, vedic maths fee, to name a few,” said Prof PL Vishweshwar Rao, convenor of PACC.
The survey also found that instead of spending 80 per cent of their revenues on infrastructure development and payment of fees, nearly 60-70 pc of it goes into pockets of managements.
“A large number of teachers do not even have the requisite qualification and this directly impacts the quality of teaching in private schools,” said the prof. Parents who participated in the deliberations rued it was unfortunate that prof Tirupati Rao Committee that was set up to regulate fee, ended up recommending 10 per cent fee hike every year.“We have demanded the government to roll back any fee hike this academic year and any increase in fee should be in consultation with parents. Further, all private schools should compulsorily upload their balance sheets online,” said Prof Rao.