The formal and informal payments made by parents in 2012 for children’s education rose to 1.7 billion lei, up 31 million lei on 2006. The parents contribute 1 leu to every 1 leu allocated by the state for general primary and secondary education, shows the sociological study “Formal and informal payments made by parents to preuniversity education institutions” that was conducted by the Public Policy Institute and the Center for Sociological Investigations and Marketing “CBS-AXA”, with financial support from Soros Foundation Moldova, IPN reports.

According to the poll, the largest part of the money as formal payments is allocated for purchasing the uniform required at the education institution and school supplies, and for buying additional teaching aids, often at the insistence of teachers. In the case of informal payments, the largest amounts are paid for private individual or group lessons.

The parents from towns spend about 6,800 lei on the education of a child, while those from villages two times less. The informal payments for a student in urban areas total 1,500 lei a year, while in rural areas - 365 lei on average.

After the presentation of the study, Deputy Minister of Education Igor Grosu said that the Ministry, in partnership with the United Nations Development Program, will launch the two-year project “Young People for Transparency in Education”. Within it, students and young people from 20 settlements of Moldova will be involved in the identification of solutions to ensure transparency in the education process in schools. The best practices suggested will be awarded and integrated into the Ministry’s education policies.

The survey was carried out on a sample of 1,107 respondents from all over Moldova. The margin of sampling error is 3%.