Petrina Francis, Staff Reporter

The Government is to introduce a policy to address auxiliary fees in schools, following the hiking of these fees by some schools.

These fees, which vary from school to school, usually cover developmental, PTA, insurance and laboratory fees, among others, and range from $2,000 to $12,000.

Auxiliary fees are not mandatory, but schools usually ask that students pay them at the beginning of each school year.

"We are now going to start the debate about the auxiliary fees and we have to put a policy in place towards dealing with auxiliary fees," Andrew Holness, Minister of Education, told The Gleaner yesterday.

"Clearly, government has to now look on how they (auxiliary fees) are set and we are hoping that it will be done in a more participatory fashion with all the stakeholders involved," said Mr. Holness.

He noted that his government's commitment is not just to removing tuition, but also to increase funding to education.

"But that does not say that we do not endorse the position that parents ought to pay and those who can pay we encourage them to pay. Education is the nation's business and all stakeholders should contribute to it," the Education Minister said.

Alphansus Davis, president of the Association of Principals and Vice-Principals told The Gleaner yesterday that he was in agreement with a policy to regulate auxiliary fees.

"That aspect needs to be regulated because we can't have a system where people increase these fees to supplement tuition fees," Mr. Davis said.

Meanwhile, Mr. Holness stated that there was some confusion that free tuition meant totally free education.

"We intend to clarify that. Not that we created the confusion, many persons probably wanted to do that to escape paying fees totally, but we were very clear and decisive that we wanted to remove the obligatory fee from education and that we expect will improve access," he said.

petrina.francis@gleanerjm.com