Want to enrol your child in Chandigarh's best schools? Shell out lakhs!

Tribune News Service

Naina Mishra

Chandigarh, April 3

Spiralling school fee is gradually making education out of reach of the common man, with the admission fee touching over Rs1 lakh and the annual fee of a kindergarten student crossing Rs80,000 in private schools in the city.

One of the most expensive schools in Chandigarh – Strawberry Fields High School, Sector 26, charges Rs1,07,000 as the one-time admission fee for classes VI to X and Rs1,55,000 annually as the tuition fee.

For the humanities and commerce stream, Rs1,86,000 is the tuition fee and the cost of the science stream is even higher at Strawberry Fields with a fee of Rs2,00,000 annually. However, the admission fee of higher classes is lower (Rs37,200) than that of children enrolled in junior classes. The charges for transport, external examinations, stationery and school trips are taken extra from the students.

Atul Khanna, Director of Strawberry Fields High School, said, “The factors contributing to an expensive cost of education include fulfilling ongoing professional development needs that are required for delivering high quality programmes, associated physical and virtual infrastructure, contextual and relevant teaching and lesson planning tools and platforms, and funding school improvement programmes according to the rules laid out by international accreditation bodies.”

Next is Vivek High School, Sector 38, that charges Rs29,000 as the quarterly fee for toddlers, which converts into Rs1,16,000 per annum as cost of education of a child in pre-primary class.

“The cost of living is going up and inflation is at 6-7 per cent. The fuel prices are going up. The water tariff in Chandigarh has also increased. When inflation is having an impact in every sphere, how can education remain economical? Private schools provide effective education than government schools as we provide all facilities. We have one teacher for every 15 students, whereas government schools have 1:30 student-teacher ratio. Our expenses are way bigger and we have to manage on our own without any funding,” said HS Mamik, Director, Vivek High School.

At Delhi Public School, Sector 40, the annual fee for classes nursery to V is higher at Rs98,400, while it is Rs99,600 for students studying in classes VI to VIII. The cost breaches Rs1 lakh mark as the tuition fee for classes IX to XII stands at Rs1,00,320 for an entire year.

The admission fee at Chitkara International School is Rs96,850, while the annual fee is Rs88,520 (Class I to V) and Rs90,280 (VI to X). Bhavan Vidyalaya, Sector 27, charges Rs80,616 as the tuition fee in a year for children enrolled in pre-nursery to KG.

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