Durban - School fee increases are expected to be in the region of 8% next year. This is according to National Governing Body Foundation chief executive Tim Gordon, who said he expected an increase of 8% across the board.
He said an increase of around 8% was not exorbitant when one considered the biggest drivers of school fees. These were salaries, administrative costs and maintenance.
“And they are out of the control of school governing bodies,” Gordon said. They were decided by the state, where governing bodies had no input.
“Next year, the salary increases will be about 8.5%.
In respect of administrative costs, which included amenities such as lights and water, the city council or the National Energy Regulator decided by how much these costs went up. “And they’re going up by about 16%.”
On maintenance, Gordon said that while governing bodies were expected to maintain a school’s grounds, they still belonged to the state. And that cost was also out of the control of the governing bodies.
He said the foundation had strongly urged governing bodes to consider the macro-economic environment in which most South Africans found themselves.
“We have asked our schools to be aware and keep fee increases at the lowest possible levels.” In KwaZulu-Natal, at Vryheid High School, the fees will increase by 7.5%, from R9 200 to R10 000. “Obviously it’s not easy for a school governing body, but if you don’t increase the fees, you cannot maintain a high standard of schooling,” the chairman, Willy Gevers, said.
At Vryheid High, each year the SGB prepared a budget for the next year. Each department submitted a budget in September, and then the finance committee got together and worked through those budgets. “We look at where we can cut. If one department’s budget is too high, we cut it”.
He said the biggest portion of the school’s budget went on salaries.
At Westville Girls' High, the fees will go up by 8.5%. Parents of girls in Grade 8, who paid R28 545 this year, will pay R30 970 next year. Parents of girls in grades 9 to 12, who paid R25 410 this year, will pay R27 570 next year.
The school said that every year it worked with a zero-based budget and this yearly calculated figure, and the number of pupils enrolled, determined fees for the next year.
At Durban Girls' High, the feels will go up by 8%, from R23 300 to R25 200. “The budget is set by the school governing body and is presented and approved by parents at a general meeting,” the school said.
The chief executive of the Federation of School Governing Bodies of South Africa, Paul Colditz, said an increase of around 8% was reasonable. Municipal levies played a major role in driving up school fees, and the federation had noted they had gone up by an average of 18% a year over the past five years.
On average, municipal levies made up 7% of a school’s budget, which was more than the total subsidy schools received from the Department of Education. One could not compare the inflation rates of schools with those of households. Households generally had a “mixed basket of services and goods” whereas a school’s “basket” was quite specialised and the “school inflation rate” was thus higher.