School Headmaster: Parents Will Continue Chipping In For Water, Food

The ban imposed by the Ministry of Education will in no way influence the school exactions.

Parents’ committees have been officially prohibited to collect money in schools and kindergartens. The headmasters have told the tut.by portal what this ban is going to change.

According to the Ministry of Education, the guardian council will still have a right to collect funds. Herein, parents don’t have to give out cash; the money will be transferred to the bank account of an educational establishment.

— Parents’ committees are now strictly forbidden to accept money from parents. Everything should be performed officially, through the guardian council, which doesn’t have a right to accept cash either. A parent should go to the bank and transfer a certain amount to the account of the educational establishment,” — Spokesperson for the Ministry of Education Julia Vanina comments.

In a Minsk kindergarten, they say it seems unlikely they will be able to switch to the cashless transfers right after the imposed innovations.

— The guardian council has been handling all the financial issues in kindergarten since long ago, we have no parents’ committee, — a manageress of a kindergarten in Minsk says. — The parents transfer money to the account of the department of education, which has special cell units for each concrete educational establishment. Actually, it has been prohibited to collect cash since long ago, but they did it anyway as it is impossible to make all transactions cashless. How to buy toilet paper and water on an urgent basis? Without cash, the guardian council would have to take a decision at their session, allocate a specific sum and make a shipment agreement, for example, to get some water. Of course it doesn’t seem too complicated when everyone coordinates their actions, but this requires time.

Representatives of one of Minsk schools have explained nothing is going to change straightaway.

— Parents will continue chipping in for toilet paper or food. Nothing will change in this regard, as it’s the basic needs of their children. This also concerns buying materials for home ec. studies, like cereals, threads, and fabrics – it will all be covered by parents, — a Headmaster of a Minsk school says.

— What is going to change then?

— Everything is heading in the direction of elimination of cash transactions, to make all payments via a bank account. As soon as an establishment opens its account, the guardian council can be reformed into an LLP.

— Will a parent transfer money to the account to pay for a student’s nutrition?

— We will switch to the student’s card soon. A school student’s parents will transfer money on it, and the schools will obtain scanning units, similar to the ones in stores. A kid will have dinner, scan the card and the corresponding sum will be debited. A school student will press the same card to the validator, the card will show “0”, but all the trips will be recorded and the parents will be able to see every step. The system is aimed at prevention the parents from giving out cash and being outraged about someone taking advantage of it.