Recently, a news broke out on the Internet that caused heated discussions among the majority of netizens: a middle school in Shuyang, Henan Province, took a pair of parents to court on the grounds that they owed their children 15,000 yuan in "tuition and miscellaneous fees". The court ordered the parents to pay the arrears and pay 3,000 yuan in liquidated damages, but the parents have not been able to fulfill, so they have been placed under compulsory detention for 15 days.
Loading...
What couldn't be more surprising is, where is this high "tuition and fees" spent? In the eyes of most netizens, nine-year compulsory education should be completely free. And the fact that this fee can actually make a parent face 15 days of detention undoubtedly gives people a strong sense of discomfort.
Of course, as a court ruling, the school does have a certain legal basis. However, as parents and students, we have more questions: When will compulsory education no longer be "compulsory" and "free" in the true sense? What exactly are the high "tuition and fees" used to support? How should the education department explain this in the face of this?
After careful investigation, one of the sources of this high "tuition and fees" is mainly the increase in non-essential expenses of schools. For example, all kinds of cultural and sports activities, evening self-study camps, etc., in fact, from the perspective of pure teaching, are not necessary. However, these additional costs can be used as "other income" items for the school. From a financial point of view, it gives the school an excuse to collect more fees from parents.
The really important purpose of compulsory education itself should be to provide nine years of free basic education to every child. This is in contrast to the various "extra fees" that some schools currently impose on parents. Nine-year compulsory education should not become a "goose" for school meals.
In fact, we should not focus only on this specific case. More importantly, the education sector and the government should be soberly aware of the responsibilities and obligations that compulsory education should bear in the true sense. High "miscellaneous fees" undoubtedly place an unnecessary burden on many families and may even be a cause of school dropout.
Education should be authoritative and equitable, and no additional fees should be imposed. We would like to see a society with a more complete education mechanism, the most basic purpose of which is to provide an equal environment for every child to grow up, rather than being treated unfairly because of differences in economic conditions. The education department should give everyone a clear answer, so that more parents can feel at ease with their children's education.
This incident has fully exposed the problems of the current compulsory education system in some places. We hope that the education authorities will put themselves in the shoes of parents and students across the country and give positive and responsible explanations to the problem, so as to achieve fairness and inclusiveness in the true sense. Only in this way can we say that "compulsory" education gives every child equal opportunities.