Dubai — Students at Dubai Women’s College (DWC) can breathe easy with the private transport operator finally resuming most of the bus services, though the final pricing is yet to be ascertained.
However, 25 Emirati students have already quit the college in a span of three weeks due to the transport woes.
Humaid Mohammed Obaid Al Qutami, Minister of Health and Chairman of Emirates Transport, said the issue would be resolved soon, but did not specify immediately if there would be a rollback in costs.
After the college’s reopening on August 31, the private bus operator, Emirates Transport, increased the fees from Dh300 to Dh1,200, coupled with the fact that the buses did not pick up the students from their homes initially.
“The transport problem has caused a lot of damage to us and it has been absolute pandemonium since we reopened,” said DWC Director Dr Howard Reed. “About 25 students have quit and an undeterminable number are still coming late. Usually, there is up to 3 per cent movement in the first two weeks of college. However, we have never had so many dropouts like this year. The big bulge is essentially due to transport problems.” About 20 per cent of them have already exhausted the number of days they are allowed absence.
Last week, the college had said it would not accept any further “withdrawal requests” from Emirati students, citing lack of transportation facilities. However, the students cited other reasons to quit.
Dr Reed hoped that students would stop dropping out following the resumption of operations.
Thursday saw 20 out of the 22 buses pick up women students. About 700 students depend on Emirates Transport to take them to the college.
“Emirates Transport has not yet spoken about pricing and we hope that they may fall back on what is more acceptable to parents. Tripling or quadrupling the costs is very extravagant,” Dr Reed added.
An official from the company, which also picks up students of other colleges, said that it had increased transportation costs by over 100 per cent for Sharjah Women’s College students, while DWC students experienced nearly four times fee increase. The college and the transport company are yet to reach a consensus on the fee costs and hope that next week would see an end to the problem.
Preeti Kannan and Asma Ali Zain