Act against school interviews, govt told

Updated on: Thursday, February 10, 2011

•Do you have relatives abroad?

•How will you decorate your child’s room?

•Are you willing to cough up an extra fee if your child’s school sends the class on a picnic abroad?

•What car do you drive?

•What’s the size of your flat?

These are some of the bizarre questions that schools are said to ask parents during pre-school interviews. A collection of such questions has been compiled by the Forum for Fairness in Education (FFE), a Mumbai-based NGO and used in a legal notice to the government. The notice said that while the government legislation on education outlaws both pre-primary interviews as well as donations around admission time, both practices have been more than prevalent during nursery admissions that are drawing to a close.

In addition to grilling parents on finances, said the notice, several schools want details of parents’ occupation and educational qualification, on the basis of which a child secures admission. In certain cases, parents have even been asked whether they have a computer with internet at home, as some schools send circulars via email only. Schools have also asked parents to sign an affidavit stating that they will not object to fee hikes in future, said the notice.

Directed at the chief minister, education minister and Mumbai’s deputy director of education, the notice seeks an answer to what the government plans to do about the malaise. “The admission procedure for pre-primary started in October 2010 and will be completed by February 15, 2011, for which almost 85 per cent of the unaided private schools took interviews of parents as well as the children,” said the notice, which also mentioned the recent case of a school that asked parents for a character certificate from the local police station.

Interviewing three-year-olds and administering them written tests for admissions has, for long, been a bone of contention amongst academicians and educationists alike. But with the new Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act banning all screening of pre-primary children and calling for a fine ranging from Rs 25,000 to Rs 50,000 for any school that breaks the law, questions are being raised about just why this piece of legislation is not being implemented.

With admissions drawing to a close, FFE’s legal notice has asked the government to set up a committee to investigate malpractice during admissions. If the government fails to reply to the notice, FFE says it will file a public interest litigation in the High Court.

Act against school interviews, govt told

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