It pays a lot to take extra lessons

CHENNAI: When his daughter appeared for the class 12 examinations three years ago, Suresh Kumar spent nearly Rs 24,000 a month to coach her in three subjects. Her yearly school fee was only Rs 28,000. Cost of coaching continues to rise with parents sometimes shelling out more than school fees in pursuit of high marks.
Tuitions for physics, chemistry, mathematics and accounting are in demand, says A S Arul, director of Arul’s coaching centre.Classes are conducted twice or thrice a week. “There are a few reputed teachers who charge up to Rs 15,000 for subject a year and conduct classes in groups of five students,” says Lata Narasimhan (name changed), the mother of a Class IX student who goes for math tuition. “Earlier, he went to a teacher who charged Rs 3,000 a month for a subject when his monthly school fee is around Rs 3,500,” says Narasimhan. Students opt for extra tuition as schools are not able to devote much time as coaching classes do. “Tuition centres start their classes almost three months ahead of schools and the training is intensive. So they are able to devote time to each topic,” says Sindhuja Dakshinamurthy, a class XII student, who takes coaching in three subjects and pays Rs 9,000 a year to study in a class with 150 other people.
Her parents do not mind paying the fees as they feel that it will help her get high marks. “The institute has promised to return the fees if she manages to score more than 90%,” says Manonmani, Sindhuja’s mother.
Sindhuja is confident of doing well in the exams and says that the extra coaching helps in managing her time and she gets guides and notes from the centre. “We teach them to strategically work through the syllabus to get high marks,” says Arul.
Many students join coaching classes after they fail to perform well in the half-yearly examinations. “When their children do badly in school exams, parents have no choice but to pay through their nose for extra coaching,” says Suresh Kumar. “Parents are ready to spend any amount of money as doing well academically has become important,” says Shubham Vats, director of Achiever Learning Company, a coaching institution in Adyar. “Also, parents don’t have time to coach their children,” he says. At his 16-year-old institute, students pay up to Rs 10,000 a month for getting a personal tutor to come home to teach a subject. The institute also organises group classes in schools where students pay Rs 6,000 per subject a year to study in classes with 50 other students.
However, high costs need not always mean better quality. “My son used to go to a teacher who taught a small group of students in her house. She used to charge Rs 700 a month but my son still did well,” says Narasimhan.