Indian schools shouldn’t raise fees

Dear Sir,

I completely disagree with the letter “Indian schools should raise fees” (Gulf Times, January 26) because the present fee structure has been approved by the Supreme Education Council (SEC) for each school individually, based on the facilities available within each of them.
If the schools operating in Qatar don’t make profits, why are most of them going ahead with opening additional schools/campuses? It proves that the schools are making money.
In fact, Indian school fees are not so low. Also, many of the Indian parents in the middle-income bracket will be unable to pay if the fees go up. Only those parents who work for government organisations and some national and international companies get children’s education allowance. Most expatriates in Qatar work for the private sector which doesn’t give any educational allowance to its employees. Under this situation, increasing the fees would only help school owners/managements to make more profits and it will not benefit the teachers at all.
Some schools are even operating additional classes after normal hours charging extra fees, making more money.
I feel that the following points need to be studied and debated to improve the standards of teaching in Indian schools:
- A vast majority of teachers recruited by the schools are housewives who don’t have any experience in teaching.
- Schools don’t provide training to their teachers and their continuous development.
- Recruitment is not done professionally.
- Getting Indian visas for teachers could be made easier.
- Teachers are not allowed to take tuition privately. But some of the schools ask teachers to hold special classes for weaker students in the evening and their managements generate money out of it as well. But the teachers are not adequately rewarded for this.
Finally, I feel that schools should not be run as commercial enterprises at all and if possible, they should operate as non-profit organisations.

HAK, (Full name and address supplied)

Strides in sports development

Dear Sir,

Qatar is marching ahead in sports. The state boasts a number of state-of-the-art stadiums, highlighting the government’s commitment to sports development.
Qatar has already hosted many international sports events, including the 2006 Asian Games and is preparing hard to host the 2022 FIFA World Cup which is considered  the second biggest sports event after Olympics.
Qatar is not only making its mark as an excellent host of international events but is also showing its prowess as an active participant of various sports activities. Success in AFC U23 Championship is just an example.
But some quarters in the world don’t seem very happy with Qatar’s success and advances in the sports sector. They try to portray the country in bad light wherever they get a chance. So Qatar has to be very careful and should do its best not to give any reason for its critics to run a negative campaign against it.
Meanwhile, march on Qatar!

Khurshid Alam, The Scholars’ International School, Doha

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