Parents protest fee hike at New Horizon School

Agitated parents want to know the reason for the fee hike, which the school's management has failed to explain

Parents protest fee hike at New Horizon School

Over 100 parents protested outside New Horizon School in Navi Mumbai on Saturday over a recent fee hike which the parents allege, they were not consulted for.

Meeting demands: According to parents, New Horizon School in Airoli has been hiking its fee every year since its inception in 2010

According to the members of the Parent Teacher Association (PTA) of the school, the institution can make changes to the fee structure only after consulting parents. The school has been hiking its fee every year since its inception in 2010.

The school, which is based in Airoli, had called some parents the previous night, asking them to attend a meeting on Saturday, however, many were not informed about the same.

Owing to the ever-increasing cost of education, many parents are worried that soon affording a decent education for their children will become impossible.

C J Shriwadkar, parent of a student from Std III said, “The school was started in 2010 and since then, the school has hiked the fee every year. What makes matters worse is that the school did not have a PTA for all these years. Hiking fees is only permissible after a meeting with the PTA.”

He further added they they were ready to pay the fee according to the new structure, however, the management did not provide a reason for the fee hike.

Now parents demand to know the reason before further payments are made. Parents were seen protesting with placards in their hands asking the management to give them the reason for a fee hike every year.

Some parents also claimed that the school never called them for a PTA meeting or to elect the members of the association. “I was informed last night that there would be a meeting the following day in order to elect PTA members.

But others did not get the message and hence today’s elections could not be held properly. There were hardly eight parents who were present in the class for the elections in a class where 60 are supposed to be present,” said Rahul Jeste, parent of a student studying in Std IV.

Defending the school’s decision, Tanuja Bhatt, principal of the school said, “The decisions are not made by me; I follow the decisions taken by the management. The elections that were held today to elect the class representatives for the PTA were an incomplete one.

We will soon conduct another meeting to elect various representatives. As for the current fee hike, only the management can answer that. I am simply informing the parents regarding the change in the fee structure.”u00a0