£800 'hidden cost' of sending a child to a state school - your experiences?

I seem to remember a proposal a few years back that school uniform should be available from at least 3 suppliers, and I wish this happened. Our Elder DD's school uniform was only available from 1 supplier who charged £15 each per blouse, £30 for a skirt and £35 for a blazer. Then there was the pe kit and sports shoes, with separate footwear required for hockey, football and general sports.
I am sure that uniform would be cheaper if there was competition between suppliers, and I wish that schools were not allowed to get away with the underhand selection that this amounts to.

DD's school shoes have just cost me £65. She has fairly hefty orthotic insoles, and those were the only pair we could find that met hospital requirements for fully lace-up with removable insoles, and school requirement for completely plain black leather.

The insoles fit just fine into her £15 black trainers, but we aren't allowed those at school.

Jumpers here are £26 each, logo shirts £18.50 each. So, yes, uniform can cost more than mufti.

Kristina we don't get any free child travel here, and all the secondary schools are a bus ride away, so we need to pay!

Before the children went back in September, I spent £135 on 3 pairs of school shoes (although I probably could have got them cheaper, but I like to buy quality shoes).

DS's secondary school is much more expensive. They have a list of trousers which you are allowed to wear - the cheapest are £11. His blazer was £35 Then there is the stationary, the study guides, the PE kit, the compulsory coat. Plus the bus pass which is nearly £300 a year. There are expensive subjects too - DS is doing photography and resistant materials.

Our Primary school is a little better, but mainly because we can walk there and they are more relaxed on uniform - as long as you have the jumper and the colour of the shirts/trousers are right its okay.

kristina, sixth form college is further education, not higher education, so not the same as university.

As talkinpeace said, education or training is now compulsory to age 18.

DS wants to go to uni, therefore he needs to go to sixth form college to do his A levels or equivalents, therefore we have to pay £665 per year to get him there.

HTH.

Talkin - my post was just about the cost of attending school. What are the educational charities that help with enrichment?!

I've never heard of any. My area is fairly low income (although often just above the fsm amount). Do they really help with optional extras?

Kristina see what suburbanrhonda wrote
our schools have no 6th form
college is nigh on compulsory
transport is not free

Not at all Bunbaker I adore spending time with my dcs. I do not enjoy taking a days annual leave to drive upwards of 45 minutes in the freezing, driving rain so ds can run about on a muddy pitch in the schools colours. But I love him so I do it.

I dont think infant school costs us anything like that much

• lunches (currently free - but surely parents would have to provide lunch one way or another anyway)
• uniform. Currently far cheaper than normal clothes would be. Also new to you where clothing is 50p if parents want it.

• photos - again a choice. We got yrR but havent got others, plenty of photos with a mobile phone these days!
• music lessons - again a choice, and far more expensive out of school privately/if home schooling. We will do it but it seems good value and not at all compulsory part of being at school.
• there is a yr6 residential but its the only one in 7 years so not an annual cost.

There is a pound here and there for non uniform days and I honestly think thats it. More like a fiver than over a hundred!!

This tread is quite depressing. I kind of get the feeling that having children is a bit of a burden for some people.

I think this about relative poverty. No no one died from not having music lessons or going on school trips, but it is reasonable that most dcs should be able to do these things.

I don't think it's quite that much here. School shoes are disproportionately expensive £45 vs £20.Bloody football boots break the bank 3X £35 X 2 a year - not essential though.Uniform is dirt cheap from supermarkets, I actually think that saves money.

School trips are quite reasonable in the order of £10 once every term or so. For me it's the investment in time and effort I resent, endless costumes to assemble and performances to attend, ferrying them about during school hours to represent the school in sporting events F!@king football again. This on top of the usual bake sales, fares etc.

DS is now at sixth form college as his school has no sixth form.

Cost of train fare for the year - £665.

And that's the concessionary rate

I have two DDs in years 3 and 6. Atm, I would say primary is just below that, but secondary will easily be above.

DD1:
Uniform £150
Year 6 residential £250
Music lessons £150
Weekly tuck shop £20
Non school uniform events £15
Photos £30
Christmas cards £10
School trip £15
Christmas / end of year gifts £20

That's about £660

Dd2 same as DD1 except no residential, instead a year of swimming lessons at £150, so she'll be £560.

However, next year when DD goes into year 7, it will easily top £800.

School uniform (including shoes, coat and bag) will be about £300. Just buying the regulation clothes (blazer, skirt, PE kit etc) comes to about £180.

School bus will either be £580 or £290 depends whether the school subsidises it.

Music lessons (no idea how much yet)

As she plays an instrument, she'll go on the music residential. No idea of cost yet.

The year 7 residential is the second week of term. I expect that will be about £200.

Food for cookery lessons I suspect will be between £100 and £200 a year.

Then, they run optional residentials like the skiing trip, the Australian sports trip (thank god she'll be too young for that one!) I'm going to limit her to one per year for that.

And the day trips, photos, non uniform days, tickets for the shows she'll be in and so on...

I fully expect the costs to easily top 1k pa, but it is quite an affluent area, so I don't think the school worries about keeping costs down much.

Better get saving .

Really interesting thread.

My dc are spread across 2 schools (3 now dss is at secondary, but I haven't seen enough to form much of an opinion yet)

Dd1 is at a very good primary, 2 class intake in the middle of an estate. Higher than average number of pupils on FSM. School's website lists expected trips and costs for a year. Lots of experience days with costs at a minimum. She gets a taxi which is provided by County because she meets the criteria. School has an enrichment week at the end of summer term for ks2, activities varied between free and a one night residential of water sports for £80. She wanted the residential, and it was a fab experience, not least because only 9 kids went, and the 3 girls on the trip travelled in the deputy heads car with the top down singing loudly! The Friends group is now very active, but keep costs down. They still manage to support the school, I cannot sing that school's praises enough.

Ds and dd2 are at the village school, 2 minutes walk away. This is a more mc area, trips have become much more over the past couple of years. This year dd2 went to a local natural history museum, cost £1 (towards maintenance/diesel of school minibus, museum is free). Last year, similar topic the school too the kids to Whipsnade! The yr4 residential last summer, for 1 night was over £120. All the extras seem to be more, by about a third.

Both ds and dd1 do swimming, each school uses a coach. For ds the cost was £40, for dd1 the cost £22.50. Similar distance, in fact further for dd1!

Uniform for both schools has optional logo'd bits. My tribe have 1/2 of the logo'd jumpers, all second hand. The rest of the uniform is supermarket. Because only the jumpers are different (royal blue vs navy) I can still hand down to dd2. Village school asks for the PE to shirt be in the child's house colour, but siblings are all in the same house. This does not have to be logo'd, and about half have the logo'd ones.

Dss is at a local academy. He has to have logo'd blazer, tank top, PE t-shirt and PE shorts. Everything else is supermarket, but the above were expensive enough. J believe there was a charge for the locker. Because he's chosen this school, ge cycles from his mum's but has to get the train from here, which is about £3 a day. We looked at passes but because he's only here half the week it would have been more expensive.

It is unlikely any of the other dc will go to that school, in my town we have 3 grammars and 6/7 others within easy reach. Ds wants to go to one in the next town, because of the zoning on the buses the pass would cost the same as the pass to the faith one on the other side of town. Dd1 has her eye on a grammar, and dd2 is too early to tell. I am contemplating selling a kidney or 2.

Our primary kept the yr 6 residential trip (Mon-Fri, IoW activity centre) affordable by running it in Nov or Dec, and the PTA supported it. Parents paid £120 which was a bargain, especially considering the fantastic activities.

I wouldn't describe uniform , lunch and music lessons, or even trips, as 'hidden' costs though. I am more about the schools, usually faith or selective in some other way, like grammar, that have very expensive uniforms, extensive kit lists and all these 'voluntary contributions' to the school maintenance fund etc. it's another layer of selection. Hidden selection, you might say.

thatbloody I totally agree.
Dd has been offered a trip to Malaga. For 3 nights, 3 star, two meals a day for nearly 600 pounds term time of course.
I can't help thinking I could take the whole family away for not much more on a similar basis but for a week (particularly if it were termtime)
The same with the Disneyland Paris trip.
I had previously taken the four of us for longer in a better hotel with four day park entry for around the same price AT CHRISTMAS.
I'm not mean but at the same time I think it's important for our travel budget to include all of us and not just one person.
I will make an exception if it comes to stuff we wouldn't do as a family such as skiing which is not my cup of tea brrrrrrr

I am gobsmacked by this thread and the amounts that some parents pay. When I first read the article I genuinely thought it was sensationalist as no way do I spend that amount of my DC at school - I doubt it is even as much as 150 over a year per child (that's a uniform bought from supermarket, shoes and trainers, plus one trip and a few very cheap things like 1 non-uniform days).

So for me a more interesting question is "how do some schools manage to do so much for free/cheap and other school can't?"

Our school asks for nothing much although parents could generally afford it as in nice mc area. Small amount donated for snack in early years classes. PTA events totally optional. Have logo uniform but only 50% wear it and anything sensible goes. No rules on shoes or coats. Lots of supermarket cheap options and huge amounts of kids in very worn hand me downs etc It's a fantastic high performing state school

Primary school didn't cost anything like that .

Non uniform school - yay!
Lunches at about £44 per half term
I residential in Yr 6: £12
Entrance for PTA disco 50p, and any money for cake sales etc.

I think that was it! The school is in a very mixed area with lots of disadvantaged families and the PTA worked hard to fundraise. The school and PTA covered the costs of all trips and because everyone could see the benefit of the PTA input there was lots of help, running events, staffing stalls etc even if they couldn't contribute cakes etc.

Secondary ;
Uniform, initial outlay and top ups if shirts and trousers over 3 years: £200, so averaged at £70 a year, say.

Lunch: £1.90 a day so that's about £390 a year or £420 with about 3 added drinks a week.

Music lessons (individual half hour a week) £150 a year, £25 discount for paying upfront.

Music after school (2 hours a week band session) £90 a year.

Thorpe Park: £25 (optional , but a highlight)
Somme trip £80 (optional but a valuable experience, I think) £80
Activity Week: a choice, most at about £30 , most expensive, water sports , £80, some free options

Other sundry activities, readings by authors, a cinema trip, other stuff: probably £30-50 a year.

The music lessons and club are free to those on FSM. Some if the trips, too.

I think the school (well regarded, good results, S London, high ratio of FSM students) does a good job in offering good opportunities at low cost. But I find myself wincing every time I press 'confirm ' on ParentPay. and we are not brassic. DS does another out if school activity that costs about £600 a year. I don't know how families with 3 or more kids manage.

Ledkr, Ofsted are already very tight re pupil premium. Every school has to show what it's been spent on. Some schools will spend it all on resources and extra teaching assistants to provide a better education. It doesn't have to be spent on helping the parents, that's there job not the schools.

PP afaik has to be used for enrichment type activities so uniform wouldn't be covered. In our school it pays for an LSA to help with reading and maths. Not that a lot of them need it but the parents don't come up with any ideas themselves and this fits in with the LSA's other duties.

School swimming alone has amounted to approx £300 between them for my two!

I would say its more than that with the cost of residential trips with pretty much 100% attendance.
What infuriates me with the yr 5 and 6 residential trips is the lack of shopping around to provide the children with the same experience for a better deal.
They're paying too much for what they're getting -mine did a like for like out of school club residential trip for literally half the price of the school one.

I work with children in special circumstances and am dismayed that pupil premium is not being used to help parents with this cost, it seems to be absorbed into the school budget.
I am hoping Ofsted will tighten up on this as some point.

Talkinpeace wrote

" If you live more than a certain distance from the school you get free transport to and from school , regardless of income .

Not any more see the Oxfordshire cases
not if you live "out of catchment"
not if your kids are in 6th form college

If you are on FSM here you get a clothing grant for school uniform and you don't pay for school trips or music tuition

Maybe in your school but not in the ones in this county"

I understand that , hence the use of the word " here " in my post

I didn't claim that I was speaking for the whole uk. Like everyone else who has posted, I'm only talking about the costs are our schools /in my area . You might as well quote every single post on this thread and write " not in my area " afterwords , because it seems that every school and county is different

And Of course the local authority don't cover travel costs if you decide to send your child out of catchment . Or if they are college or university . Do you really think they should ? What if you decide to send your child to a school 25 miles away -is it the local authority's job to get them there ?