Parents pay €28m in ‘voluntary contributions’ to plug gaps in school finances

Parents are paying in the region of €30 million a year in “voluntary contributions” to schools to help plug gaps in finances, according to new figures.

Schools say they are forced to seek money from parents because they do not receive enough State funding to meet everyday expense.

Financial returns from all schools gathered by the Department of Education for the first time show that €28 million was reported as received at primary and post-primary level in the form of voluntary contributions from parents during the 2020-2021 school year.

These contributions likely understate the full extent to which parents are subsidising education given that voluntary contributions have risen in recent years and many schools seek separate “school charges” for photocopying and art materials.

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The data comes as average voluntary contributions are set to climb to €101 this year at primary level (up from €81 last year) and €143 at second level (up from €124 last year), according to a survey of more than 1,000 parents by Barnardos.

This is despite the introduction of a free schoolbooks scheme at primary level and record levels of capitation funding in the 2023 budget due to cost-of-living pressures.

Primary schools have been advised not to seek voluntary contributions from parents this year for any book-related expenses on foot of this year’s free schoolbook grants to schools.

Official guidance states that these grants should cover pupils’ textbooks, workbooks, copybooks and, “where funding permits”, stationery.

However, the guidance also states that schools may seek contributions for art materials and photocopying if the book grant is not sufficient to cover these resources.

[ Schools seeking ‘voluntary contributions’ of up to €350 from parents ]

A spokeswoman for the Department of Education said it recognised that the total book grant provided may not be sufficient to cover all related classroom resources.

In order to reduce the financial burden facing parents and schools, the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) has called on the Government to fully fund schools and is seeking a 20 per cent increase in the school capitation grant.

The union said primary schools received a capitation grant of about €1 per pupil per schoolday to cover running costs, while second-level schools received almost double that amount.

“Prior to the pandemic and the current cost-of-living crisis, schools were already struggling to meet basic expenditure. Schools must not be expected to fundraise to meet basic expenses and parents must not be relied upon to keep schools afloat,” the union said.

Minister for Education Norma Foley has said the Education Act states clearly that no fee can be charged for the provision of education under the curriculum.

“I want to be very clear: voluntary contributions are, as their names suggest, voluntary. No fee can be charged for the provision of education as per the curriculum,” she said last month.

She added that in response to the cost-of-living pressures, a “once-off” capitation payment of €90 million had been made available to schools, equivalent to an increase of about 40 per cent, to cover running costs such as electricity and heat.

However, charities say that while voluntary contributions are not mandatory, many parents feel compelled to pay them.

The Society of St Vincent de Paul and Barnardos report that parents have been chased up by schools when they do not pay them or that children are made to feel inferior when they are not given a journal or locker key.

The National Parents Council added that the payment of voluntary contributions continued to be a source of tension between schools and parents. The council’s chief executive, Áine Lynch, said while successive ministers for education had maintained that no parent had to pay a contribution, this was not enough.

“That response is not working. There is a disconnect between what ministers for education say and what happens in schools. Sometimes parents do feel under pressure and children get letters from the school... the complexity of the relationship with schools make parents feel under pressure to pay,” she said.