A statement was issued by the active committee of contracted teachers in public primary education, saying: "After the Ministry of Education undermined the concept of free education in public schools by imposing a registration fee of 6 million Lebanese Lira for secondary students (where the minimum wage is 9 million Lebanese Lira), it has become evident that some public schools are asking parents for an amount of $50 per student (for the parents' council) under the pretext of supporting teachers."
The statement continued: "This is unacceptable as it contradicts the concept of free education in Lebanon. How can parents be asked to pay in dollars when the Ministry of Education insists on paying teachers in Lebanese Lira? ... Furthermore, the educational sector is also forced into the crazy pricing in the country by making citizens pay everything in dollars while dealing in Lebanese Lira."
It argued: "The idea of asking parents for money is completely rejected, because this means burdening them with the failure of the Ministry of Education once again. The funds of public schools are filled with dollars, and some accounts contain more than $100,000; the ministry is the one that issued a circular limiting withdrawals to no more than $2,000 a month. Therefore, the funds should be able to cover their expenses from the support money they have received ... As for teacher salaries, it is the responsibility of the ministry and the government to pay them from the budget allocated for teachers in the Ministry of Education, not from the funds designated for the operational costs of schools. Thus, it is forbidden to reach into the pockets of the poor to pay $50 while the schools’ coffers are full, just as the officials’ coffers are in this country. It is contemptuous of public opinion and donor agencies to link teachers' salaries to fund money, as the number of teachers whose salaries are paid from the funds is limited and represents an exception, while thousands, over 90% of the contractors, calculate their hourly wages from the salary or contributions line item in the Ministry of Education, or they are hired for these roles and receive their dues from UNICEF."
Regarding the disparity in school fund balances, and the Ministry of Education's statement that the reason is the donor agencies, particularly UNICEF, which supports the school funds that register Syrian students according to their numbers, while not supporting the school funds that do not have Syrian students in morning sessions ... The statement considered that "this specific issue bears the responsibility of the Ministry of Education and the Lebanese government that does not impose its conditions on donor agencies for equal support for schools, regardless of the students’ nationality, in addition to the lack of flexibility among those concerned in enforcing the redistribution of fund money to meet the needs of all schools instead of accumulating it in the Central Bank of Lebanon on one hand and limiting the amount of withdrawals on the other."
It continued: "Days separate us from October 9, the date for the start of the school year, according to the Minister of Education, but there has been no announcement from him yet regarding the value of incentives and their payment schedule, and 300,000 students are still waiting, while at the same time, pressure is being put on parents to pay $50. This leads us to ask: Are we really facing a crisis in the start of the academic year? Or are we facing pressure to exploit the refugee issue in order to compel donor agencies to support public schools for the Lebanese? Or is there something more serious, which is the exhausting of students, parents, and teachers to take the file to dead ends, with the last being the file of integrating Syrians into the system?"
