Parents who have students at Nairobi’s Upper hill school are protesting the arbitrary increase in school fees from the governments recommend shs 53,000 to shs 80,000.
A section of parents who spoke to Hot News said they are angered by the school’s management move to increase the fees especially in third term yet there were less activities.
“If you look at the fee structure, the fee has been hiked by a whooping shs 26,000 per student per year. The fee structure has additional items like other payments including creditors and PA activities. During the second term, the school asked parents to pay shs 5,000 per student for creditors. The same applied to the 3rd term” said a parent who sought anonymity.
The parents were also asked to pay shs 2,000 for Physical Activities (PA) in the 1st term, shs 5,000 in the second term and shs 9,000 in third term.
The parents argued that there have been no physical activities in the third term and that this is unfair.
The hiked fee structure was issued to parents on 8th June 2021 and signed and stamped by the the School Principal M. Muiya.
On 28th May 2021, several parents were forced to pay shs 37,000 as school fees for their children in the 3rd term.
The parents said they should have instead paid shs 27, 0000.
They showed us receipts from the school.
They have appealed to Education CS George Magoha to intervene and have the school management reduce the high fees.
According to the School Website:
Lord Delamere, a British Settler founded the School in 1956 and was initially named after him “Delamere School”.
It was mainly for Europeans Boys and Girls who could not make it to Duke of York (now Lenana School) or Prince of Wales (now Nairobi School) which were the only Schools European Children attended. In 1959, the Girls remained at Lady Delamere Girls (now State House Girls) while the Boys moved to Lord Delamere School.
In 1969, the School changed its name to “Simba Secondary School “then later to the present Upper Hill School, named after the Area and Road where the School is situated. It is located along Upper Hill Road, next to the British High Commission Offices and Don Bosco Church on the same Road and rests on a 13.6 Acres piece of Land.
Beginning the Year 1997, the School began to change gradually from Day to Boarding and finally became Full Boarding in 2004. It currently accommodates 1000 Students who all board. Initially, the Delamere Hostels hosted the few Students who were Bright and Needy then but over the Years, more Dormitories had to be put up to facilitate the necessary numbers.