Telangana: School fee hike impacts parents and teachers alike

Hyderabad: The fee hike issue in private schools across the city is not only giving hardship to parents, but also to the school teachers.

With just a few days left for the new academic year to begin, like every year, teachers are on a race to poach students for admission, apart from being forced to reach out to parents for collecting pending fees.

Due to this, along with parents and their wards, even teachers are suffering, with no summer break for them, as they are forced to canvass for admissions in the scorching heat. According to the private school teachers, their plight can be mitigated only when the Education department and the state government will come up with stern policies to control fees.

Apart from this, if any student's school fee is pending, teachers are forced to call their parents to collect money. They are given a target, with their salaries put on hold if they fail to achieve it.

Rama Rao, a private school teacher, said, “We are educators, not collection agents or salespeople. It feels very bad roaming in various residential colonies and asking parents to admit their wards to the school. We are forced by the school management to do so and if we don’t canvass, money will be deducted from our salary. This is happening because there is no control on the private institutions by the state government, as there is never any audit in private institutions.”

“We are facing an uphill task in convincing parents to get their child admitted in our school. The school management has threatened that our salary will be put on hold. Last month, when I could not complete my target, my salary was put on hold and these issues have made me feel very distressed,” said Shirisha Rao (name changed), another private school teacher.

“Collecting pending dues or canvassing for new admissions is not the duty of teachers. This is a never-ending issue, and for the past many years, we teachers are being harassed.

It will be better if the state government comes out with some solution – for example, providing fee concession to meritorious students. With this, parents as well as teachers will get relief,” said Sanjeev, a private school teacher.