A good numbers of English medium schools have been operating in the country without any valid registration with the government. This practice paves those schools to collect abnormally high tuition fees as well as other charges.

On the aftermath of such complains the Ministry of Education has directed the Department of Secondary and Higher Education (Maushi) to immediately bring all schools into the book.

Deputy Education Minister Mahibul Hasan Chowdhury told Business Mirror that “No institution would allow run academic activities without proper registration from the government,”

According to the guidelines of the Ministry of Education, it is mandatory for schools to obtain a registration certificate from the appropriate registration authority (Board of General Education) by submitting the registration fee as per the private school registration rules conducted in foreign curricula.

But there are allegations that most of the schools are operating without registration. There is no accountability. Again, the actual information of the institution and the student is not in the hands of the government. According to the latest data from the Bangladesh Bureau of Education Information and Statistics, there are 145 English medium educational institutions in the country, with about 11,000 students. But in reality this number is even higher. Although there was a registration rule in 2016 regarding these schools, it was not actually implemented.

Section 19 (3) of the Rules has been reminded in the guideline of the Ministry of Education. According to the section, fees may be charged from students for conducting extracurricular activities in private schools, for any special facilities and for the use of high quality equipment or technology, but in this case the full expenditure statement approved by the management committee must be notified to the parents in writing. These fees are not fully disclosed to them.

In addition, it has been mentioned in the instruction form that there are rules to mention the amount and details of tuition fee, admission fee, sports fee, library fee, tiffin fee, printing fee and other fees collected in different categories every month or year.