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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

following on from private school thread

53 replies

KnittedBreast · 23/01/2011 12:53

Someone said that if people stopped buying uggs then more people would relaise how affordable it is.

If this is true, how much does private school actually cost?

Those of you with kids in private school or know about fees, what are they at start of primary school and then at secondary school or gcse year?

im genuinly interested as ive alaways been told it costs a fortune (40k a year?)

OP posts:

mamatomany · 23/01/2011 14:12

93% of people do support their state schools so they should be nothing short of amazing, i'm surprised anybody would want to use anything but

Dragonhead · 23/01/2011 14:18

They should be amazing mamatomany but unfortunately for us the local state option would not have meant a good standard of education for my DD. We would have happily sent her to a state school if there had been an alternative but ufortunately all of the other schools in our neighbourhood were massively oversubscribed.

MABS · 23/01/2011 14:53

prep school 13K per annum for ds, senior 18k for dd as a day pupil but no extras apart from school trips

cupcakebakerer · 23/01/2011 15:38

I would love to be able to send our child to private school - so sounds like I should get saving now really!

2rebecca · 23/01/2011 16:32

Many private schools have bursaries that can pay up to 100% of the fees if your child does well in the entrance exam and your income is below a certain level.
Look at the websites of schools near you if you are really interested. Fees are usually clearly listed and any bursaries available.

feistychickfightingthebull · 23/01/2011 16:42

Our ds is in a prep school and it costs 3k all in, including breakfast and after school club, lunch and guitar lessons. We are sacrificing quite a bit to keep him there. Our older ds goes to a state secondary and our aim is to transfer him to boarding in year 9

FairPhyllis · 23/01/2011 16:42

I looked up the website for my old school and the fees are now 3200 quid a term. That's for a girls' day school in the North of England. That is at the low end of private school fees, but it was good value, as academically it was in the same league as the top London independents, which cost a lot more.

That covered tuition, textbooks, science materials and public exam fees. The extras were school lunches (but I always took a packed lunch in), uniform, instrument lessons and speech lessons if you had them, and school trips.

I had a 50% scholarship, which must have helped my parents out a lot. I was a bit shocked the other day when my mum said that when they first sent me they only had enough money to pay for three years, but they decided to gamble on being able to get better jobs in the meantime.

Also, when I was there, a lot of girls had their fees paid through the Assisted Places scheme, which meant that the school was pretty socially diverse. I don't know what it's like now. I know that when Assisted Places was (criminally) scrapped, the school was trying to set up its own bursaries scheme but I don't know if it worked out. Girls' schools don't typically have the huge endowments that old boys' ones do that help them run bursary schemes.

feistychickfightingthebull · 23/01/2011 16:43

3k a term that is

Cribbage · 23/01/2011 16:58

6k a year here. Well worth it!

onceamai · 23/01/2011 17:48

London Day School: 5600 per term - and rising(or 1350 per calendar month) per boy at 13+. Extras such as lunch and lost books approximately 300 a term on top. Girls can be about a 1000 a term cheaper around here if GPDST. So no, you can't economise if you have anything like a normal budget.

GMajor7 · 23/01/2011 17:56

Joint income of 20K here, so if we were to cut out eating, accommodation and FUCKING BREATHING we might be able to afford it

corlan · 23/01/2011 18:10

GMajor7 - If you are on a joint income of 20K your child has a shot at a free place.

Keep breathing!

LadyOfTheManor · 23/01/2011 18:14

It depends on age. Year 7 is more expensive compared to year 6...then the GCSE years are more again, as are 6th form.

My brother and I went to the same school at the same time, but he started in year 5, I started in year 9 (I went to a girls' school before we moved house and he an independent primary school).

This was a boarding school so the fees might be different, my mum & dad paid £29k a year per child (this was a-level year-it was less the younger we were).

I have been looking at a private day school (ages 3-18) for my ds, and their fees are £1800 a term, which is quite reasonable (3 terms per academic year).

thekidsmom · 23/01/2011 18:23

For us, about £14k per year each child, plus more unifrom, school trips, music, all of which are about twice the price of the same for state schools. And for us, plus train season tickets of aobut £800 each. That's for day schools in Surrey.

Would have to be UGG boots made out of gold leaf I think!

Hulababy · 23/01/2011 18:27

We pay about £8k a year for prep, was a little less for preprep. Will be more at secondary and more again at sixth form level.

It very much depends where you are in the country. School fees vary massively. We are un Sheffield and this is as high as it gets at this age round here. That is for day school.

Nowhere near £40k here though.

You should also allow for up to 10% fee increases per year, although fortunately we haven't had anywhere near that yet.

ednurse · 23/01/2011 18:29

You can cut and cut and cut some more but truth is if you have to cut out basic needs such as decent food/holidays/clothes then you can't afford it in the first place. Simple as.

I own 5 pairs of Ugg boots for the record, bought over the space of 4 years. Most bought cheaper in America....not sure why Uggs come into it though

duchesse · 23/01/2011 18:30

£10000/year for our children's secondary school. 20% sibling discount. Very few extras (a trip to the theatre or two a year at about £15 a pop, a small sum for DT/art sundries (under £10 afair)). Very affordable uniform.

Hulababy · 23/01/2011 18:32

DD's school fees include lunch and also milk in preprep. Day trips are included but not residentials. Support for dyslexia, lit/num support and G&T are included int hat. We don't pay more for sports, music and other subjects.

However we do pay more for residentials and indiviual music lessons for specific instruments.

Breakfast club is £2 a day and after school club is £4 a day. We don't use either. Extra curricular clubs are between £3 and £5 a week. Music lessons are approx £14 a session. All optional. No expectation to use them.

Uniform costs more as we have to have specific items but most from John Lewis and more reasonable these days. We do have a lot of uniform items though and the hats and coats are costly.

happyhoggy · 23/01/2011 18:32

We pay £15,600 per annum for two kids, aged 4 and 7. This excludes uniforms and extras such as piano and ballet lessons.

My salary is £20,000 per annum so i go to work so that i can pay the fees.

DH pays for mortgage and everything else.

The second hand school uniform shop is the place to be for uniforms

frenchfancy · 23/01/2011 18:36

Just to add another perspective - my children go to a private catholic school - and we pay 45? per term.

Of course it is France so it may not be conviennent for everyone

thinkingaboutschools · 23/01/2011 20:01

I agree with corlan. Gmajor7, I have a friend whose parents (in retrospect) must have had a very small income - father unemployed, mother working part-time. She got a 100% scholarship/bursary (not sure which it was) to a good private school. The fact that she was on this bursary mattered not one iota while she was there. She went onto Oxford afterwards.

LadyOfTheManor · 23/01/2011 20:15

My uniform was only available from John Lewis. Typical.

Dragonhead · 23/01/2011 20:19

The uniform for DD's school is very expensive (£15 a blouse anyone?) and if I'm honest it really does annoy me -there is only one shop that sells it and they are obviously making a killing. If I thought the profit made from uniform sales was going to the school (perhaps to fund bursaries)I wouldn't have a problem - I do grudge lining the pockets of the snooty shop owner though

LadyOfTheManor · 23/01/2011 20:25

Dragon I'm with you on that, my blazer was £90 (!) my mum kept hold of it for my brother so it got some wear. The girls and boys wore different ties and shirts though...that was expensive.

My brother had;

Head boy tie
Rugby captain tie
Cricket tie
House colours (excellent behaviour) tie
Warden's tie (headmasters "gift")

He didn't have to pay for those though. He did have to pay for his "colours"-the coloured rim on the breast of his blazer to show his achievements, that cost £40 a time (could only be done by the washing/launder people in the boarding school)

Dragonhead · 23/01/2011 20:32

I've started being a little rebellious and topping up her uniform with some plain woollen cardigans from Next ( I do buy some of the school ones but sneak in a few of the plain ones)-very similar to the school ones but without the embroidery. No-one has said anything yet

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