Back to school at Okahandja

PRIMARY schools in Okahandja were rapped on the knuckles yesterday for their refusal to enrol children whose parents are too poor to pay a year’s school development fund fees.

Parents pointed fingers at Eden and Aoro Primary Schools, and claimed they refused to register their children for next year’s Grade One classes unless parents forked out the entire year’s school development fund in one go. The regional directorate yesterday described these complaints as isolated cases.Regional deputy director of education Simon Tsuseb confirmed that some schools in Okahandja had ‘told parents to get full school fees’ before a child would be accepted into Grade One.Tsuseb met with principals yesterday and said he reminded them that it was illegal to show away parents who couldn’t pay. During a visit to Okahandja on Wednesday, The Namibian was approached by a group of women who accused the schools of refusing to register their children.Tsuseb said this was unacceptable but added that schools were under immense pressure to collect funds, not for the benefit of teachers, but ultimately for the benefit of the children. He said schools were struggling to make ends meet. Tsuseb said schools needed much more than Government could afford and that was why they tried to get as much funding as possible. He said schools in poor areas had to make do with the minimum, while schools in high-income areas received sufficient funding from parents.He said the regional directorate of education had discussed the allocation of funds to schools and was deliberating whether to allocate a higher proportion of the school budget to ‘poor’ schools next year.Ombudsman John Walters said ‘principals should be proactive’ and should not simply turn away children but try to work out a win-win situation with parents. He recently held discussions during which he pointed out that ‘unfortunately orphans and vulnerable children are not excluded from the provisions of the Education Act and its regulations’ pointing out that no matter the financial situation of parents, schools demanded the same payment from everyone.Walters argued that school boards should establish what amount parents were able to afford.He made a case for the rich subsidising the poor.’It is inconceivable how a parent who is a CEO of a company and a parent who is a farm labourer or domestic worker should pay the same amount. That is unjustifiable and plainly unfair,’ the Ombudsman said.