How Much Do We Really Spend On Education? A Look At Myself.

Ever since the Right To Education (RTE) bill was passed, we’ve seen furious debate everywhere (almost everywhere: nobody cares for it outside of India, where education is easily accessible no matter how poor you are). Views are diverse, as they should be in a matter of such importance.

Then there’s this piece by Manu Joseph that came out a week ago, where he talks about nepotism as it exists in practically all walks of life in India, but particularly among the rich – from Rahul Gandhi to Rahul Dravid, apparently all Indian boys are spoon-fed by their moms and are well taken care of. I don’t disagree at all, this seems to be generally true. Maybe it ought to be. Every parent tries to ensure that his/her offspring is better off than him/her, and this is not even limited to us humans.

It’s interesting to read Manu Joseph’s piece again, in the light of the ongoing debate of the rights and wrongs of RTE. This, and a few tweets exchanged with @shilpanand, led me to do a rough, back of the envelope calculation on how much we spend on our children’s education, as against how much our parents spent on educating us.

My Education:
I’m not counting food, boarding, clothing and other incidentals like transport. No holiday expenses either. I’m calculating only tuition fee, books, and other incidentals towards education, like hostel fees or school bus charges. Bear in mind that this is a rough calculation and I am consciously overestimating.

Let’s see.

School: I studied at Arya Central School, a relatively upmarket English-medium school, run by an Arya Samaj-backed trust. When I started class 1, the school fee per term of three months was Rs 35. When I finished class 10 at the same school, it increased to Rs 60 per term. If I remember right, the school bus cost Rs 150 for a year. I used the school bus only from class 5 to 8. Before class 5, there was a private taxi service. I’m estimating Rs 300 a year for the service. I am not sure how much textbooks by NCERT cost at that time, but I remember that the English language books cost Rs 3.50 at Class 10. I am using this as a yardstick (yes, I am THAT old). A lot of my books were hand-me-downs from my older siblings, but I am disregarding that.

So that makes:

Ten years school fee: 60×3 x 10 years: Rs 1200
Four years school bus fee: 150 x 4: Rs 600
Four years private taxi charges: 300 x 4: Rs 1200
Books: 3.50 x 8 (subjects) x 10: Rs 280
Stationery: 200 x 10: Rs 2000

Approximate total expenses on my schooling: Rs 5280

Pre Degree (equivalent to Junior College in Mumbai and Plus One/Two in other cities): I studied in a government college. A decent place, though Government Arts College was a leftist “adda”. In my junior year, there was a Congress-led government in Kerala, which meant strikes and disruptions every second week. There was much less disruption when a leftist-led government was in place. I must admit that the quality of teaching was high – when they taught, they taught quite well. But even then, most students attended private tuition to get any studying done. I don’t remember how much pocket money I got – but I never spent my pocket money on anything constructive or meaningful, so it doesn’t count as my parents’ investment in my livelihood 😉

College fees: 225 x 2 years: Rs 450
Private tuition: 1500 x 2 years: Rs 3000
Books: 1000 x 2 years: Rs 2000
Stationery: 200 x 2 years: Rs 2000

Approximate total expenses on my secondary education: Rs 7450

Undergraduate: I did a bachelor’s in accounting from the same college. The fees did not change much, though I remember Dad being caught short by the cash demands of the college PTA, students’ union and random associations who turned up on admission day. I’d say we spent Rs 1500 on admission day, including all the fee and random donations. The later years were humdrum, nobody worried about paying up bullies from PTA, the unions or associations.

College fees, first year: 1500 x 1: Rs 1500
Second and third year: 300 x 2: Rs 600
Private tuition: 2000 x 2: Rs 4000
Books (estimated): 1000 x 2: Rs 2000
Stationery: 500 x 3: Rs 1500

Approximate total expenses on my undergraduate education: Rs 7600

Post Graduation: I did a two year masters in communication and journalism at the University of Kerala. Financed myself, mostly. It wasn’t much anyway, around Rs 1500 a semester, four semesters. However, I paid Rs 8000 for the first semester of a self-financing course I got accepted into, but did not continue. Will add that.

So how much did my parents spend on ensuring that I had a good education so that I could support myself and my future family? Let’s add up those figures – Rs 20,330. Let me add a random Rs 50k to this figure, just in case, to cover for inaccuracies and anything I may have missed out.

More or less Rs 70,000. Rupees Seventy Thousand.

Much less than the Rs 120,000 I have already paid for my three-year-old who will start school this year. If I add her playschool fees, the total figure is Rs 160,000, more than double what my parents spent. And she’s not even started her formal schooling yet!

Is the comparison valid?

I don’t think so. There are many variables. I live now in a city way more expensive than the one I grew up in. My income is monthly income is more than what my father earned in a year at my age. The value of the rupee has depreciated; the value of real estate has appreciated, so on and so forth. The economic comparison is untenable.

But what about the thought process that drove us to make decisions for our kids? It’s worth taking a look at. My parents wanted us to have a largely egalitarian education, didn’t bother too much about the finer details about “which” school. It was more of a basic requirement – English medium, decent teaching, relatively easy access, affordable. They did try to make us shift to other more established schools in the city, but decided that the trouble wasn’t worth it.

College was driven more by societal norms. In those days, getting a place in a government college was a matter of pride. If you didn’t have good enough marks, you didn’t get through. No management quota, no political influence, nothing else really worked. Government colleges gave you an egalitarian outlook, and this was a major influence when I was offered a place in an elite private college for my undergraduate course. In a government college, you could see film actors’ kids, kids from villages, children of fruit sellers and tailors (a best friend sold lottery tickets in the evenings), sharing classroom space with each other. It gave you a good understanding of how society worked, all the good along with the bad. Perhaps this was what my parents wanted. I am not sure how it helped me, and I often wonder if, and how, life would have been different if I chose the elite college instead of the government one.

In a nutshell, the thinking, at least in my parents’ mind was: we gave you a decent education, which we could afford. What you make of it is your lookout.

And what motivates me in my choice of schooling for my kid? Pretty much the same kind of thinking – I have to give her a decent education which I can afford. Beyond that is her lookout. There’s one difference. I didn’t choose a school which has an egalitarian student base or outlook. I chose one as elite as my income can afford.

My parents were a product of the frugal generation, who saved up and spent their savings on things they valued for a lifetime. I am part of a consumer generation who measures himself and others by what we wear, the cars we drive and the houses we go to.

What do you think? Do comment here.

Haroon Bijli

How Much Do We Really Spend On Education? A Look At Myself.

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