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• Hard times are battering parents and schools system

• Some of SA's better-known schools and their increases for next year

Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga told The Times yesterday that she was looking at ways in which the government could help fee-paying schools that have been unable to recover 27.45% of fees owed to them.

Jaco Deacon, national operations officer of the Federation of Governing Bodies of SA Schools, which represents governing bodies of 1100 institutions, said financial pressure would increase next year after cash-strapped parents were unable to pay up this year.

Roger Millson, executive officer of the Governing Body Foundation, which represents boards of schools in Gauteng, Limpopo, Free State and North West, said "most" of his member schools will start next year on a "negative budget".

A Fedsas survey of 420 schools found that:

• School fee exemptions - where parents have been fully exempted from paying because they cannot afford to - cost those 420 schools a total of more than R82-million this year;

• The highest fee-exemption rate this year, R17.76-million, was in Free State;

• Last year, the 420 schools recorded R112-million in "irrecoverable fees", including exemptions and other non-payment; and

• At schools in middle-class suburbs, the government provides only between 3% and 7% of running costs, meaning many had to increase fees to balance their books.

Fedsas expects the number of parents who cannot pay to rise next year as the country crawls out of the recession.

Many fee-paying schools have increased their fees - by about 12%, which is double the rate of inflation - to compensate for fee exemptions granted to poorer parents.

A snap survey by The Times revealed 12% to be the norm for fee increases.

Johannesburg's Greenside High has raised fees from R17850 this year to R20350 next year. At Hilton College in KwaZulu-Natal, fees for boarding and tuition have risen from R144900 to R158900.

Deacon said parents were paying "astronomical" amounts to educate their children.

"The government needs to know that the no-fee exemption is not the only solution, and they need to step up as well," he said.

Fedsas chief executive Paul Colditz said outstanding school fees could account for the large increases.

"There are always parents who do not pay school fees in full," Colditz said.

Millson said that, though schools tried to consider non-payment by parents when drawing up their annual budgets, "most" of his member schools will start next year on a "negative budget".

"This is problematic because the school cannot cover its operational costs and may have to terminate contract staff," he said.

The government allocates funds to fee-paying schools according to whether they are situated in rich or poor areas. However, schools in middle-class ares, ranked quintiles four and five, are battling. Schools in quintile four areas receive R404 per pupil per year, and those in quintile five receive R134.

Colditz said: "State funding is not nearly enough to even try and cover services at these schools.

"In a quintile five school, with 1000 pupils, the state would give R134000 while running costs are nearly R4-million," he said.

"The school has to scrape the remaining money together from fees. If parents don't pay, it is of detriment to the school."

Motshekga, speaking from the African Education Ministers Conference in Kenya yesterday, said her department is "reviewing" the quintile system

"As it is, 60% of schools in the country have been declared no-fee-paying schools," she said.

She said if schools in "affluent" areas have parents applying for fee exemptions, it was up to the institution to decide whether they could absorb the costs.

"If more than 10% of pupils are exempted from fees, the school can apply to the department to compensate them and must say how much they can absorb," she said.

However, compensation will only extend to what the state pays for no-fee schools - R1000 per pupil per year, she said. - Additional reporting by Germaine Dunn