Pupils pay own fees

Mpraeso, E/R -- Some children at Mpraeso in the Eastern Region, have been forced to take up the responsibility of paying their own school fees.

This is the result of a craze among young parents to leave their children in the care of other grown up members of the family and travel elsewhere, preferably to Accra, to trade or take up other jobs.

The caretakers, mainly grandmothers, most of whom are old and have no regular income, cannot pay school fees and provide the other needs of their wards.

Children who are therefore determined to go to school, have no other choice than to pay their own school fees and strive to provide other school needs, for as long as their parents fail to send money to their caretakers for that purpose.

During a visit by Junior Graphic to some schools in the Mpraeso town, it was found out that half the pupils of a class in one of the schools, were living with their grandparents.

Evelyn Owusua Asare, a Class One pupil of Mpraeso Methodist Primary School, whose parents live at Donkorkrom and is staying with an aunt, said she saves ?200 every day from her pocket money of ?500 to enable her pay her fees. According to her she has so far paid ?20,000 of her fees and has a balance of ?8,000 to pay. She hopes to settle the amount before the end of the academic year.

Evelyn said she does not want to go back to Donkorkrom because her mother will not allow her to go to school if she goes to live with her parents.

Bernice Antwi, a Class Four pupil of Mpraeso Presby Primary “A” School, said her mother sells second hand clothing in Accra while her father is in Cape Coast. Bernice claims she has not seen her father for a long time.

“I have been staying with my grandparents for the past five years and Mother hardly visits”, she said.

According to Bernice it is from the meagre amount her grandparents earn from the sale of their farm produce that her fees is paid and therefore things become difficult when harvest fails.

For Class Four pupil, Gifty Sackitey, and Martha Kpoeti of Mpraeso Methodist School, they have each other as guardians for they have been living together in a rented room in the town since September last year.

Gifty, the older of the two, does the cooking, cleaning, washing and also ensures that Martha who is in Class One, does her homework before going to bed each day.

Gifty explained that they were living with their elder sisters who had also left them for Accra to trade. The two girls who are not sisters are supervised by an elderly woman living in their house.

According to Gifty, there are times when their pocket money runs out and they have to borrow money from friends to travel to their parents at Kutoso, near Kwahu Tafo, for money. This, she said, is seriously affecting their studies.

An intern at the Mpraeso Presby Primary School, Mr Kwame Brobbey Asafo-Boateng, complained of truancy among the pupils. He said the pupils are more interested in trading than in schooling.

The Assistant Headmaster of Mpraeso Methodist Primary, Mr Emmanuel Eshun, on his part, complained that most of the children have not paid their fees and attributed the problem to the absence of their parents from town.

Mr Eshun said most of the children are so keen on making money that they absent themselves from school at the least chance.

He said these days, funerals provide a good opportunity for them to earn some money by arranging chairs and running errands.

“These problems are affecting the academic performance of the pupils”, he said and asked parents to be responsible for the upkeep of their wards and not leave them in the care of their grandparents.