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Malek Helali
Doha
THE Ministry of Education and Higher Education on Saturday released the list of 38 private schools and nurseries that have been given approval for raising tuition fees.
With the registration date for the academic year 2017-2018 approaching on March 1, 2017, the Director of Private Schools Licensing Administration, Hamad al Ghali, announced that 70 percent of the applications by private schools for increasing tuition fees were rejected.
Addressing the press on Saturday, Ghali said,"The ministry starts receiving applications from private schools for increasing tuition fees in December, every year. Given the parents' concerns with the issue of augmented tuition fees, the applications were carefully reviewed individually depending on each school's circumstances and financial situation."
According to Ghali, the applications were reviewed by the ministry's high-level evaluation committees and approved by the Minister of Education after revision.
"Eighty-nine applications were rejected for reasons such as 'incomplete financial reports' and 'exceeding 20 percent accommodation capacity'," he further said.
Ghali stressed the ministry's efforts to announce the approvals for tuition fee hikes before the stipulated registration period that starts on March 1 and continues until October 12 for citizens, GCC nationals and residents, and until January 31 for the new incoming families after obtaining their residency permits.
The registration for returning students extends until May 1. These efforts are made to give the parents sufficient time to decide whether they wish to transfer their children to a different school where the fees range between QR 15,000 and QR 40,000, according to Ghali.
œSome schools got approvals in parts for the raise last year and this year because their budgets were so deficient that we had to divide the raise over several years in order to gradually reach the balanced budget without heavily impacting the parents' expenses, ? he added.
The approved tuition fee hike ranges between 1 percent and 15 percent. Commenting on the high 15 percent increase, Ghali explained that although the percentage may seem to be high, it applies only to nurseries. œNurseries with an existing fee ranging between QR5,000 and QR6,000 got approvals for increase exceeding 10 percent. ?
œThe ministry also sent the approved tuition fee statements to all private schools requiring them to publicly post them for the parents' reference. Each parent should ask for reports and statements of the official and detailed fee approved by the ministry before proceeding for payment, ?Ghali said, adding that the registration fees need to be refunded if the student is accepted but not admitted for lack of capacity in the school. Otherwise, the school is required to accommodate the student, he pointed out.
Furthermore, Ghali said that the ministry is looking into over 60 applications for opening new private schools to accommodate the increasing number of students adding to the existing 183,443 registered students for the academic year 2017-2018.
Also, the list of schools eligible to offer the coupon system is expected to be announced by mid-March.
