Parents at Flipper International School received a jolt on May 23, 2025, when a letter confirmed that next year’s “Category 1” tuition will increase to 178,558 Br, a 76,525 Br leap equivalent to roughly 75pc.

One father, who asked for anonymity, had expected “a gradual rise” over five years, as earlier notices suggested. Instead, the full increase takes effect at registration for the 2025/26 school year and will remain for 2026/27.

“It’s not just the fee rise that worries me,” he said. “The school has not delivered on the infrastructure it promised, and teachers’ salaries have not been raised as they said they would.”

A sense of broken promises sharpens the father’s anger. School managers attributed the phased rise to the addition of new classrooms, a refurbished laboratory, and higher teacher salaries. While teacher's salaries have been raised, parents say, other promises failed to materialise.

“How can they demand an extra 76,000 Br when nothing on the ground has moved?” he wondered.

The dispute dates back to the Ministry of Education’s decision to revise a 2016 directive governing school licensing and renewals. On February 12, the Ministry told officials of the Education & Training Authority (ETA) that the directive had to be amended to make licensing more transparent.

A new clause defines a tuition-fee increase as any “extra charge” on top of the previous year’s bill. It excludes “harmonisation”, the levelling of fees within the same grade. The change is supposed to take effect once it is published on the websites of both the Ministry and the Authority.

Under the federal rule-making procedure, every directive should appear online with the signatures of the Justice and Education ministers before it can be enforced. A link to the amended text did go live on January 17 this year, but it carried no names.

Federal legislators serving on the Standing Committee for Human Resource Development, Employment, and Technology Affairs state that the omission, coupled with the lack of an implementation guide, is in itself sufficient to nullify the rule and violates a constitutional provision that requires all new laws to respect fundamental rights.

The Standing Committee deepened the confusion by advising both federal agencies on March 24 not to apply the rewritten rule. MPs argued that no directive formally titled “General Education Sector Schools Licensing Directive” had existed before. They deemed amending it improper.

They noted that the Ministry had swapped directives 992/2016 for a new text and 1037/2025, without meeting a law issued in 2012, which requires concise and clear drafting. They concluded that the new text conflicts with higher laws and should not be enforced.

Flipper has pressed ahead regardless. According to its General Manager, Getaneh Asfaw, ETA sent the school the latest directive “1037” issued this year, directing it to harmonise fees across campuses.

Under Flipper’s plan, 1,934 students in Categories 1-4 would merge into Category 5, which already holds 1,135 pupils. All new entrants would also be placed in Category 5. The first draft lifted fees by more than 100pc, but after ETA intervention, the school trimmed the figures and, on May 23, told parents that registration based on the revised amounts would start three days later.

Numbers in the harmonisation plan are evident. Category 1 now covers 279 students, Category 2 another 322, Category 3, 210  pupils, and Category 4, 203 students. Parents argue that rolling everyone into Category 5 would leave three-quarters of Flipper’s 3,069 pupils paying more.

The meeting minutes of the Parents' and Teachers’ Association (PTA) indicate that the first sketch was shared with parents on April 7, and a detailed draft followed on May 3. They rejected an initial 12-month transition, prompting the school to offer two years, but then abruptly returned to a shorter timetable in its registration letter.

Representatives of the Association insist they never agreed. Four meetings involving the school, ETA and parents produced no consensus. Flipper initially wanted harmonisation within a single year, but then stretched it to two.

“We can’t force the school to decrease the prices,” said Mekdes Derese, ETA lead executive officer. “The only thing we can do is give options that could satisfy both sides.”

Parents have split into two online petitions. One, signed by 259 from Categories 1-3, accuses the school of pushing the plan “without transparency, adequate consultation, or consideration of parents’ concerns.” They demanded a pause in registration. Another, backed by 34 parents from Categories 4-5, found the proposal “a fairer and more transparent fee structure” that removes long-standing disparities.

A parallel story has long simmered at Sandford International School.

Formerly Sandford English Community School, it rebranded in 2001, adopted the International Baccalaureate programme, and split into primary, secondary and adult evening sections. Its governing board once had nine members, but now operates with six after resignations and a dismissal.