SEVERAL high schools are reporting a reduction in the level of payment of tuition fees for the new academic year, with suggestions of a correlation with the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP’s) promise of free education should they win the upcoming general elections.

At Spaldings High in Clarendon, collections are at between 35 and 40 per cent, down from the usual 75 per cent at this time last year, according to principal Alphansus Davis.

“Some people are paying, but not as many as we expected. Some are waiting (until after the elections), from what I’ve seen,” Davis said.

The Spaldings principal, who also heads the Association of Principals and Vice-Principals, said the situation was similar at other schools.

“Some principals suggested that things were not moving as they normally would. We assume that some parents are waiting to see the outcome (of the elections),” he said.

Additional checks by the Sunday Observer ahead of Hurricane Dean, which brushed the southern coast of the island last Sunday night, indicated that traditional high schools were maintaining their usual high levels of collection, while non-traditional schools faltered.

“They (traditional high schools) have a strong history and tradition of fee paying. In the country, for example, if a man has to sell his cow to pay it, he will do it. But there is a different perception as it relates to the upgraded schools,” said Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA) president, Hopeton Henry.

At Seaforth High School in St Thomas, where Henry is principal, “there is a literal drying up” of fees, according to the JTA boss.

Principal of Jamaica College, Ruel Reid, also pointed to the disparity in fee payment between traditional and non-traditional high schools.

“I believe the traditional high schools are collecting, by virtue of the demographics and the fact that parents are more motivated to pay the fees,” said Reid, a former president of the JTA. “It has always been the case that upgraded high schools have had more difficulty collecting.”

But whether the non-payment of fees will affect the start of the school year is anyone’s guess.

Before the onslaught of Dean, permanent secretary in the Ministry of Education and Youth, Maria Jones, for her part, said the payment of fees would not affect preparations for the reopening of school.

“We have made sure all the grants that are due to them (the schools) have been dispatched,” she said.

Hurricane Dean, a category four system, claimed three lives, destroyed homes, crops and infrastructure along the island’s south coast.