Morocco’s Private School Tuition Dispute Escalates Amid Distance Learning

"With distance learning during confinement, private schools are adamant that we pay the full tuition fees for the third quarter. Yet, in addition to the additional costs of internet or computer equipment, parents have ensured the essential teaching of their children. Do you find it fair that we pay the same amount for face-to-face teaching as for distance teaching?" explains Noureddine Akkouri, president of the National Federation of Parents’ Associations (FNAPEM). According to him, parents want to negotiate to pay only the portion corresponding to the service provided by the schools.

However, the owners of these schools are not impervious to dialogue. This is at least what Hanane Jabrane, vice-president of the Moroccan Federation of Private Education and Training (FMEFP), also a representative of private schools on the board of the Regional Academy of Education and Training (AREF) of Greater Casablanca-Settat, affirms. The FMEFP "has taken the initiative to engage in frank and realistic dialogue with the parents of the students, in order to find a common ground that would ensure the sustainability of our structures and the educational continuity while taking into account their financial situation," she told Challenge.

"At the end of this dialogue, we recommended listening and solidarity, on a case-by-case basis. For example, parents who have ceased professional activity have been completely exempted from paying tuition fees for the months of confinement. Others have benefited from a reduction of 30% to 50%. While parents whose incomes have not been affected by the pandemic have been asked to regularize the full tuition of their children," she said.

The mediation of the Ministry of National Education has not yet made it possible to resolve the dispute between the two parties. "There are schools that have taken the initiative, as part of the mediation, to completely exempt parents for the three months. Others have proposed percentages, while a last category insists on the payment of the full fees," explains the president of the FMEFP. According to Bouchaib Nadir, a lawyer at the Casablanca bar, the two parties have just positions but "the solution remains dialogue."