Ruling on schooling

The order by the apex court on fees charged by private schools, ordering them to reduce fees by 20 percent and return 50 percent of the fees charged over the summer holiday period has created a stir. For obvious reasons, the managements of private schools and parents are both following the judgment closely. So are legal experts. Some analysts have immediately put forward the argument that private schools are essentially run as corporations or businesses and that there is no room for intervention by an outside authority. This immediately brings up the question of whether education should be treated as a business no different to the selling of, say, automobiles or confectionary. Or should it be underscored by some demand for ethics and fair play for the consumers? While it has also been pointed out that parents choose whether or not to send their child to a private school and determine what fee they can spend, the truth is that given the complete collapse of public sector schools, parents have no real choice in this and will naturally attempt to enrol their children in the very best school they can afford. Depending on the income group of the parents, the charges by the schools make considerable dents in household budgets.

The primary culprit here is the state and its failure to meet its constitutional obligation to provide an education to every child in the country. The PTI government has consistently emphasised education in its campaign and should be looking at this. We all know however that realistically speaking, it will not be possible to upgrade government sector education rapidly. Private schools are the only option for millions across the country. The evidence presented before the three-member SC bench, that some school directors were taking home salaries of up to 8.3 million a month, spending far less on the running of schools, and threatening to turn away children unable to pay from classrooms does raise hackles.

A balance has to be found. Private schools, which do in the best-case scenarios offer education at par with the better schools in most countries in the world, need some mechanism to regulate them. Parents also need guarantees that teachers are qualified and that the schools are able to offer sports, laboratory, library and other facilities to their pupils. These are not available at even some of the schools at the higher end of the fee structure. What we face today is an educational crisis. Ideally, an independent board looking at schools and what standards they offer is required. The current ongoing process involving the seizure of school accounts, audit reports and other documents by FIA teams who have been visiting branches of schools in Lahore and other cities is not the ideal situation. But some measure is necessary to prevent parents from being effectively extorted into giving out huge sums, principally as a result of the lack of choice available to them if they wish to seek quality education for their children.