Maungdaw, Arakan State: Matriculation students in the State High School of Ngakhura (Ngar khuya) are facing difficulties in attending school as two class teachers have been collecting tuition fees separately, said a father of a student from Ngakhura.

The class teacher Daw Khin Ying Ngwe who teaches English and the Burmese teacher Daw Hla Hla Zan, are collecting Kyat 10,000 per student per month as tuition fees, he added.

“There are 87 students in the class and most of the students are poor, belonging to farmer’s families,” he added.

The two teachers do not care for the headmaster, the students’ parents or the teachers association. The two teachers are members of the government backed Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), said a school teacher from Maungdaw.

As students, whose families are very poor, were unable to pay the fee, the teachers dismissed students from the class and the school authority is unable to take action, the teacher added.

“Eleven students left the classroom and may be more will leave soon because the tuition fee is very high,” said a matriculation student from the school.

The school is situated under the Burmese border security force (Nasaka’s) sector number five and is ten miles from Maungdaw North,  and can be reached by water way and motor way.

“It is a state owned school, which runs on the government system. Why are the teachers collecting tuition fees from students, who are unable to pay and were dismissed from the school? It is like private tuitions by these two teachers of the USDA, said a farmer who has two children in the lower class.

“I hoped I would give my kids higher education, but now I believe I can’t give my children any more education as the state run school collects such high fees for tuition,” he said.