Private Schools are Expensive

Before Lily was even concieved, Bob and I had come to the decision that a P - 12 single sex private school was the right decision in education for our children.

We knew it would mean a lot of sacrifices on our part. Holidays, new cars and the frequent purchases of new, and often expensive, clothes that had been part of our lifestyle would be something we could not have, at least in the early years, while we were still building our careers. Did we mind? Not a bit. In fact, we felt, when we died (hopefully in the triple digits), if there was nothing left to give our kids, then at least we had given them this gift, this start to life. A better thing we couldn't think of.

And when we had a little girl, I was overjoyed to be able to put Lily on the wait list for my old school, Somerville House. It had been quite the dream of mine. I was so excited we quite literally went there on the way home from the hospital. That earned us a blurb in the quarterly magazine.

And when we decided to move to Sydney, the more expensive schools was something we actually considered. I picked a couple of schools at random (Scots College and Presbyterian Ladies' College, in case you're interested) and worked out if the change in our incomes would cover the change in school fees and still have us come out ahead. It did. I was CRUSHED that Lily would not get to go to Somerville, but I was happy we would still be able to offer our children a good education. And I hoped my granddaughter would get to be a second generation student at whatever school we picked for Lily, because I truly want Lily to love her school as much as I loved mine.

And so, after timing a drive and doing research and checking the scale of fees, we have come up with schools for our daughter and son.

Lily will (hopefully) be attending Pymble Ladies' College from Kindergarten and Archer, likewise, will be attending Knox Grammar from Kindergarten. We just fell in love with these schools. It seemed like the perfect fit for our family.

But Sarah, you haven't actually whined about how expensive private schools are and that's the title of this post!

Well, it's true, I just about died when I saw that for Lily to attend Kindergaten, presuming she goes naked and has no school supplies, will cost us $16000 and Archer (also naked and without his colours) will be $15500. But, as I'll be returning to work, my wage will more than cover this and not impact the current household finances which I don't contribute money to.

What really made Bob and I say "Uh oh," and feel very sorry for our poor, hard won savings (Again. That POOR account) was that just to send in the bit of paper with the kids' names on them is going to cost us $320 per child. Fine, we expected this, Somerville was about $250. We also expected the $2000 ish securing of their place fee, which ensures they will, indeed, be attending Kindy in the year we hoped, and is payable 2 years before expected year of entry. What we did not expect, was the tentative place fee, of $1100 for Lily and $2200 for Archer. YIKES.

This fee is a a non refundable fee that "secures" them a place in the event they perform like rockstars in their interview 2 years before entry. So yep, as long as my 4 year olds don't pick their noses, scratch their butts or cut out crooked in their private school interviews, I have not wasted $3300.

Right now, Lily is rubbing her vegemite sandwich in her hair, so it gets the proper flavour before eating. God help us.