In my days at Grammar - Mt Roskill Grammar that is - only those with a death wish, or heavy padding down their trousers, would have risked cheeking the head in the way Auckland Grammar headmaster John Morris is thumbing his nose at Education Minister Trevor Mallard.
Here we have the principal, caught red-handed sending a letter to parents of prospective pupils demanding they bring along a cheque for a school fee of $500 on enrolment evening "to confirm acceptance of the place offered" to their son, and what does he do?
Like any cornered miscreant, he swears black is white and denies any wrongdoing. Of course any payment is purely voluntary, he claims.
Why then, the request that parents cough up at the time of enrolment? Simply, we're asked to believe, for "ease of accounting."
I wonder if he will buy such romancing from the next kid caught running in the corridor, or smoking in the pupils' carpark?
Of course Mr Morris is but the latest in a long line of school bosses to ignore the Education Act and Ministry of Education instructions on this issue.
As anyone with a child will tell you, the first bullying of the school year is that applied to parents by schools seeking extra cash.
About two years ago, I raised the ire of Ponsonby Intermediate School by exposing its $700-a-year fee. This included a "compulsory charge" of $450 and an optional "school donation" of $250.
The outcome was that the ministry duly carpeted the principal, reminding him and other schools of an official circular on the subject sent out a few months earlier.
This had clearly pointed out that every New Zealand child between the ages of 5 and 19 "is entitled to free enrolment and free education." The key word is free, not fee.
The circular said that if schools specified a sum for the annual donation, "they should make it clear to parents that this donation is voluntary and cannot be made a compulsory charge."
It added that in communications to parents "boards should not use the word 'fees' or 'levy' or any other term which implies that the payment of the sum is compulsory. In particular, board cannot demand payment of the donation to confirm enrolment at the school."
Now what was it Auckland Grammar said in its letter? Ah yes. "It would be appreciated if you could bring the school fee of $500 at this time to confirm acceptance of the place offered."
One of Mr Morris' justifications for breaking these rules is that the school has been doing it for years. Another excuse for the boy smokers, perhaps?
The minister, Mr Mallard, says that Grammar's approach is totally unacceptable, which is all well and good. But of any plan of action to enforce the concept of free education, there is nothing.
One possibility would be to force schools to use a standard donation form which sets out in plain English its purely voluntary nature.
The problem is that these days, even the word voluntary has been devalued in meaning.
Think, for instance, of the sniggers it raises when used in the context of Auckland Museum admission charges. A friend with kids at Sunnynook Primary School has much the same reaction to that school's donation scheme.
He was a bit late with his "voluntary" $84 last year and got the standard guilt-trip letter asking if he thought it fair some parents should be subsidising the education of the kids of parents who had not paid. Suitably chastised, he dispatched a donation of $90.
A day or so later his child trotted home with $6 change. "I thought a donation was when the giver decided on the size of the gift," said my friend. "Yet here they are saying I overpaid."
Another alternative for Mr Mallard would be to come up with some more money so that schools could provide free education without having to resort to the fundraising arm-twisting and shaming of parents and children that now goes on. But somehow, that does not seem likely.
Read more from our Herald columnists
<i>Rudman's City</i>: Extortion thrives shamelessly in our 'free' schools
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