In the run up to the start of the new academic year in Russia, the Ministry of Education and Science sprung two surprises, admittedly long expected, on parents throughout the country. The first concerns the considerable likelihood that school uniforms, following an initiative from the ministry, will be introduced, albeit conditionally; schools will be free to choose the uniforms themselves. More crucially the ministry has announced its intention to develop thorough legal and administrative protection against the practice of local schools extorting money which continues to plague parents throughout the country.
If the initiative to implement school uniforms has already met with progress, and some schools have already introduced the changes, the case of financial demands levied against parents promises to be far more intractable. Since 2010 the authorities have “stepped up” measures against illegal and grey schemes for requesting extra money from parents, but these schemes are like the heads of the hydra: chop off one and another two or three appear in its place.
Instructive in this case is a social survey conducted by state polling office VTsIOM a year after one of the Education Ministry’s routine attempts to stop the practice of illegal financial demands by school administrations. The question asked was: “Has the practice of administering illegal fees stopped in the school where your children (or those of your acquaintances or relatives) study?” The answers were returned in the following way:
It has stopped – 6.4 %
It has remained at the same level – 51.6 %
It has remained but the form has changed – 30.5 %
It has diminished but not stopped – 11.5 %
Thus the fight against corruption has led to a result which twice exceeds the margin for statistical error defined (at 3-3.5%) by the sociologists at VTsIOM. But of course the statistics which really jump out are the 51% of respondents who report no changes at all and the 30% who say the fees have remained but in a different form. This is the same old corruption masquerading in new form. Thus did the Director of the State Policy Department in the Educational Sphere of the Ministry of Education Alexei Blaginin address parents in the run up to 1 September with a plea not to give school administrations fees that are in fact illegal and contravene newly passed laws. The civil servant recommended parents in the region “to set up a hotline for complaints concerning the illegal extortion of fees”.
“Any parents who encounter these kinds of demands from school administrations should inform the municipal or regional offices of the relevant education ministry”, said Blaginin at a press conference in Moscow. “The local authorities are compelled by law to examine and check each and every one of these complaints”.
This is all very well in theory, but practice shows otherwise. Parents are often scrutinised for using available hotlines; on the other hand, if they do not use them, they are sometimes accused of “sheltering corruption”, or even in voluntarily participating in illegal fundraising. Thus in the Sverdlovsk Region local parents decided to trust the hotline. In a month they reported 280 cases of illegal extortion in educational establishments, with 111 of the calls being made anonymously. The city of Ekaterinburg led the region for number of complaints, reporting 138 cases of the practice in local kindergartens, schools and gymnasia. In villages, where there is much less money to go around, parents are burdened with these extortionate practices much less frequently.
But when the local education ministry started to examine what the money was being spent on, they retorted that the funds had been used on repairing school infrastructure or on the provision of school dinners for the children. And in places where parents had no money to give, such as the village of Baikalovo outside of Ekaterinburg, parents of the children at the local kindergarten and primary school “Svetlyachok” were suggested to supply the school with a prearranged norm of potatoes, carrots, beetroots, onions and garlic. In this case the school administration signed a contract with the parent concerning the deliveries.
Moreover, those parents who voluntarily paid the requested fees or supplied the requested produce began identifying those who had made complaints to the hotline and then putting pressure on the parents to move their children to another school, or even on the local school to exclude the children, a move which would, naturally, be illegal.
Thus in addition to the problem of corruption, when parents are forced to contribute, there is also broad social consensus that parents should be prepared to give voluntarily to local schools.
This all sounds very well, but begs the question: how can such help be legally regulated to prevent turning into corrupt practices? One of the most instructive cases concerning illegal fund raising emerged in Moscow in 2011. As a result of the scandal, Konstantin Petrov, director of School No 1317, was accused of fraud and abuse of office and temporarily relieved of his duties. He introduced an additional monthly educational fee of 8900 roubles, together with an additional 950 roubles to be paid for each pupil’s visit to an afterschool club. A charitable organisation, the School Board of Trustees, was even set up to manage the money raised in this way.
In three years parents paid out a total of 208 million roubles to the fund. However, as a result of the investigation, it turned out that all this money could be accounted for documented. In the end the case had to be closed.
Another issue that remains hotly contested is the question of the so-called “prodlyonka” (“extension”), whereby parents pay money to the school in order to pick their children up at a time later than the school day finishes. Last year 30 subjects of the Russian Federation introduced fees for the service. In some of the regions the price of the service, which had previously been provided for free, reached 20-30% of the average teacher’s salary, justified by the fact that staff are no longer simply teaching the children but also helping their parents look after them in after-school hours. After the Education Ministry got involved, the fees were reduced or even cancelled in some regions. The position of the ministry is now stated, vaguely, thus: schools are within their legal rights to demand fees for looking after children after the school day is finished, but “this right must not be abused”.
So the current rigor against additional school fees means that the courts will be used to investigate and potentially prosecute cases of illegal or involuntary contributions. At the same time other contributions, those where proof is provided by a consideration of regional salaries and documentary evidence that the money has been legally obtained and spent, it seems, will neither be stopped nor particularly encouraged.
The situation, then, echoes that of the school uniforms. No one is against their introduction, but a single uniform for the whole country will not be enforced. Everyone agrees that the uniform disciplines, instils a culture of respect towards certain adult professions and prevents displays of social inequality, but no where will the uniform have to be the same. According to the “Law on School Dress”, and the amendments to the law introduced in 2014, each school has the right to set its own requirements for students' clothing, including its general appearance, color, style, distinguishing features and rules of dress. It seems the regulations concerning voluntary parental financial contributions are destined to remain similarly vague.
